Research on intervention methods for children's street-crossing behaviour: Application and expansion of the theory of "behaviour spectrums"

Abstract

Due to immaturity in their physical and cognitive development, children are particularly vulnerable to road traffic injuries as pedestrians. Child pedestrian injury primarily occurs in urban areas, with a significant share at crosswalks. The aim of this study is to explore whether an intervention programme based on the theory of "behaviour spectrums" can improve the street-crossing skills of primary school children. Children were recruited near a local primary school through invitation letters and were randomly divided into two groups: a control group (n = 10, no intervention) and an experimental group (n = 10, intervention). The children in the experimental group received 30-45 min of training. The child participants were asked to wear an eye tracker and performed a crossing test in a real-world street environment; in this test, they were required to successively pass through an unsignalised intersection, an unsignalised T-intersection and a signalised intersection on a designated test route. A high-definition camera was used to record the children's crossing behaviour, and the Tobii Pro Glasses 2 eye tracker was used to derive indicators of the children's visual behaviour in the areas of interest (AOIs) in the street. The evaluation was conducted on children's crossing behaviour in the control group (which received no intervention) and the experimental group (tested at two time points after the intervention: children tested immediately after the intervention and children retested one month after the intervention). The results showed that compared with the control group, the children in the experimental group no longer focused on the small area around the body (e.g., the zebra crossing area) and the area in front of the eyes (e.g., the sidewalk area), which increased their visual attention to the traffic areas on the left and right sides of the zebra crossing; thus, unsafe crossing behaviour was reduced in the experimental group. Compared with the experimental group immediately after the intervention, the intervention effect on some indicators showed a significant weakening trend in the retest of the experimental group one month later. Overall, the results show that an intervention programme based on the theory of "behaviour spectrums" can improve children's crossing skills. This study provides valuable information for the development and evaluation of intervention programmes to improve children's street-crossing skills.

Keywords: Behaviour spectrum; Child pedestrian; Educational intervention; Road crossing; Road traffic safety.