Does driving experience in video games count? Hazard anticipation and visual exploration of male gamers as function of driving experience Maria Rita Ciceri, Daniele Ruscio ⇑ Department of Psychology, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, Largo A. Gemelli 1, 20123 Milan, Italy article info Article history: Received 7 May 2013 Received in revised form 4 November 2013 Accepted 7 November 2013 Keywords: Video games Road exploration Risk perception Visual attention Eyetracking Novice drivers abstract Risk perception and distribution of visual attention while driving are crucial elements for accident prevention and new-driver improvement. This study investigates how racing vid- eogames could shape the visual exploration of virtual and real road in male pre-drivers. The visual performance of players of racing video games with and without driver’s license was tested in virtual vs. real scenarios. Attention to specific elements of different types of road interactions was monitored using an eye-tracking system. Results showed that habit- ual use of racing video games was not found to foster a positive effect on users’ distribution of visual attention, supporting visual patterns typical of novice drivers. Gamers without driving experience replicated the same patterns in a real road scenario, ignoring road signs and potential areas of interactions with other drivers, while experienced drivers gamers explored video games roads like real roads. The fact that the gamers’ driving performance was not comparable to drivers in the virtual scenario suggests that there are other vari- ables in the gameplay that create a less complex traffic scene, still the visual complexity of different real road interactions is kept in video game interactions, opening new perspec- tives towards gamers’ visual exploration of the road. Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The role of risk perception and perceptual learning in pre-drivers are important topics in transportation research and are considered crucial issue to prevent road accidents (Barg, Keddem, Ginsburg, & Winston, 2009; Ciceri & Confalonieri, 2012; Deighton & Luther, 2007; Elliot & Baughan, 2003; Husband, 2010; Mann & Lansdown, 2009; Poulter & McKenna, 2010). Worldwide studies, reviews and police reports show that young male drivers experience more accidents in their first years of driving than any other category of drivers (Clarke, Ward, & Truman, 2005; OECD., 2006; Williams, 2003). The average col- lision rate for young male drivers does not begin to decline for at least six months after they begin driving (Mayhew, Simp- son, & Pak, 2003) and as far as the Italian context the total accident rate for male start decreaseing only after five years since the achievement of the driving license (ACI-ISTAT, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012) a period of time where drivers may learn from gradual and non-systematic driving experiences, while still being highly exposed to road accident (Bjornskau & Sagberg, 2005; Groeger, 2001; Kass, Cole, & Stanny, 2007; Underwood, 2005). For these reasons Italian legislator has recently ap- 1369-8478/$ - see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.trf.2013.11.001 ⇑ Corresponding author. Address: Laboratory of Communication Psychology, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Via Nirone 15, 20122 Milan, Italy. Tel.: +39 02 7234 5931. E-mail address: daniele.ruscio@unicatt.it (D. Ruscio). Transportation Research Part F 22 (2014) 76–85 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Transportation Research Part F journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/trf