• The Journal of The Korea Institute of Intelligent Transport Systems
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.18-34
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• 2021

Pedestrian deaths in Korea due to traffic accidents are 40 percent of the fatalities in traffic accidents, which is about twice the average of OECD member countries. To reduce severe pedestrian accidents, it is necessary to apply the accident reduction measures to high-risk drivers (novice, elderly, and commercial vehicle drivers) who are more likely to cause traffic accidents than general drivers. Therefore, this study analyzed the effect of safe driving education on high-risk drivers' behavior. Here, the safe driving education is chosen as the measure to reduce traffic accidents. As part of the study, sudden pedestrian crossing situations were implemented in the driving simulator, and the vehicle trajectory data were collected to compare the driving behavior before and after the education. Most surrogate safety measures showed no improvement in the driving behavior of novice and elderly drivers, and the effect of safe driving education was found to be significant only in the group of commercial vehicle drivers. The results implied that additional measures such as pedestrian safety infrastructure and driver assistance systems, apart from the safe driving education, may be needed for novice and elderly drivers to reduce pedestrian accidents caused by them. With the findings mentioned above, this study is expected to provide a foundation to establish a plan to reduce pedestrian accidents caused by high-risk drivers.