spindrift said:
**** me.
magnatom said:I'm not guilty of risk compensation. Can you prove that I am?
How can you say this conversation is a wasted effort? Visibility is a priority in cycling and is right up there with road position and cyclecraft. As others have pointed out we are vulnerable, we don't have a cage around us, so we need all the help we can get to avoid collisions. Visibility plays a part in that. So discussions like this are very relevant.
Part of my job is running functional MRI research, where we want to answer questions about how the brain functions. A lot of this work is clinically based, however, I do work with psychologists as well. I am tempted to chat with some of the visual perception psychologists to see if they would be interested in doing a project in hazard perception in peripheral vision of cyclists with and without hi-viz jackets. If I had the time that is.
My feeling would be that on a conscience level where a driver can tell you he has seen a cyclist there would be little or no difference in brain activation, and in the way the driver would react. However, where a cyclist appears in the peripheral vision and the driver couldn't tell you if they had seen a cyclist or not. I would hypothesis that recognition areas would be active more where the cyclist was wearing yellow compared to grey/black.
Now it might be suggested that detecting something unconsciously would not affect a drivers actions. However, from what I know of psychology (not a huge amount) this is not the case. It might spur the driver to hesitate, or to look again. Any psychologists on here?
Anyway thats the science out of the way.
If you want to be seen (better) wear bright colours (i.e. yellow) not grey!
spindrift said:
**** me.
Equanimity - good word, that. Thanks.spindrift said:I was trying to say with economy of speech that the driver deserves a kicking. The cyclist seemed to treat the incident with an equanimity I would be unable to match.
linfordlunchbox said:High viz under sodium lighting has no better impact than white clothing and reflective clothing appears dark unless lit which makes it mostly inefficient.
With a drivers hat on, I can understand why the smidsy happens even with high vis on the cyclist.
spindrift said:I was trying to say with economy of speech that the driver deserves a kicking. The cyclist seemed to treat the incident with an equanimity I would be unable to match.
linfordlunchbox said:High viz under sodium lighting has no better impact than white clothing and reflective clothing appears dark unless lit which makes it mostly inefficient.
With a drivers hat on, I can understand why the smidsy happens even with high vis on the cyclist.
Tynan said:I can't accept that at all
under sodium lighting alone, perhaps to a point, but in urban traffic there's plenty of light around, and particularly from the vehicle driving towards a cyclist
there's no excuse for smidsy, it happens because people don't look for cyclists/motorbikes/anything
by all means make an argument but discounting it is nonsense, worse case it makes no difference, in all other cases it makes a difference to some degree, it can;t make things worse, please don't trot out the over confidence argument
BentMikey said:Col, you may think you're not guilty of risk compensation, but you are. Simply cycling and wearing your hiviz makes you a risk compensator.
Arch said:If someone isn't going to look, then I could be wearing one of the Jodrell bank telescopes painted yellow on my head and they wouldn't see me. But if all they are going to do is give me a quick glance, I really do think I am more likely to catch their eye in light coat, with reflectives etc...
magnatom said:If you were wearing one of those telescopes on your head, all you would have to do is lower your head and you would take out all of the traffic on the road. So I put it to you, that you would indeed be very safe wearing a Jodrell Bank telescope!
Arch said:Might have a sore neck though....