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Visual and driving behavior of novice and experienced drivers is investigated when they negotiate the vehicle between standing or moving obstructions (pedestrian and vehicle) on both sides. As the driving tasks became difficult, they sampled the right obstruction at a higher rate than the left one regardless of the position of pedestrian or vehicle. However, the novice drivers whose skill acquisition speed was slow tended to increase their fixation rate for the vehicle's direction of travel. With respect to driving behavior, vehicle speed at the meeting point for the novice drivers was faster than that for the experienced drivers. The novice drivers drove on the right obstruction side systematically irrespective of the driving tasks.

In this study, the novice driver behavior involved in traffic conflicts is investigated in order to obtain the cues of driver education program for avoiding traffic accidents. Following results are obtained that when the novice drivers encounter the oncoming vehicles, they fixate the vehicles at higher rate than the conflict objects and induce the traffic conflicts. In case of no oncoming vehicles, they also induce the conflicts because their strategies of visual search are critically concerned with the vehicle's direction of travel. They cause other traffic conflicts because it is difficult for them to maintain their vehicle on the correct lane position.

This study investigates the driver/vehicle responses as affected by oncoming vehicles and obstructions. The results showed that in most cases neither the novice drivers nor the experienced ones fixated the oncoming vehicles, but that the drivers anticipated the roadway ahead at great distances, and monitored the oncoming vehicles with peripheral vision. There were no significant differences in the vehicle lateral displacement for the avoidance behavior between the novice and experienced drivers. However, the fixation time for the obstructions was shorter and the completion time of fixations was earlier for the novice drivers as compared to those for the experienced drivers. The strategies of visual search for the novice drivers were critically concerned with the vehicle's direction of travel.