Perception of Affordance in Children and Adults While Crossing Road between Moving Vehicles

Road crossing is a perceptual-motor skill and becomes critical when to cross as a pedestrian. In the present study, we investigated gap affordance perception and crossing behavior of pedestrians when they crossed the gap between two vehicles. Children and young adults attempted to cross inter-vehicle gap while walking on a treadmill in a virtual environment. Participants crossed gaps between two vehicles facing various gap characteristics. We manipulated vehicle size, vehicle speed and gap time between two vehicles and examined participants’ affordance of crossability evaluating transition points for different task constraints. Our results revealed that children had higher transition points than adults and crossability of both age groups influenced by gap characteristics. We conclude that children were more prone to unsafe crossings relative to adults and perception of affordance affected when the road-crossing environment become constrained.