When you increase your speed, you should...
A)look behind less frequently.
B)increase your lateral vision.
C)look further ahead into the distance.Correct
When driving a vehicle, 90% of the information needed to do so is visual in nature, which makes having good control of the visual field vitally important.
As speed increases:
- Our useful visual field decreases, which is known as the tunnel effect (only the centre of the road is perceived clearly). This also occurs with alcohol.
- The ability to see and analyse what is happening around us decreases, therefore, the capacity for anticipation and reaction diminishes.
- The injuries that can be suffered in an accident will be more severe.
Furthermore, speed is directly related to reaction distance (the vehicle travels more metres while we react) and to braking distance (the faster the speed, the harder it is to stop the vehicle). Consequently, the stopping distance will increase.
For all these reasons, it is important that as we increase speed, we look further ahead into the distance.