The Psychology of the Car explores automotive cultures through the lens of psychology with the goal of achieving a low-carbon transport future. Worldwide there are now more than one billion cars, and their number grows continuously. Yet there is growing evidence that humanity needs to reach 'peak cars' as increased air pollution, noise, accidents, and climate change support a decline in car usage. While many governments agree, the car remains attractive, and endeavors to change transport systems have faced fierce resistance. Based on insights from a wide range of transport behaviors, The Psychology of the Car shows the "why of automotive cultures, providing new perspectives essential for understanding its attractiveness and for defining a more desirable transport future. The Psychology of the Car illustrates the growth of global car use over time and its effect on urban transport systems and the global environment. It looks at the adoption of the car into lifestyles, the "mobilities turn, and how the car impacts collective and personal identities. The book examines car drivers themselves; their personalities, preferences, and personality disorders relevant to driving. The book looks at the role power, control, dominance, speed, and gender play, as well as the interrelationship between personal freedom and law enforcement. The book explores risk-taking behaviors as accidental death is a central element of car driving. The book addresses how interventions can be successful as well as which interventions are unlikely to work, and concludes with how a more sustainable transport future can be created based on emerging transport trends. - Features deep analyses of individual and collective psychologies of car affection, moving beyond sociology-based interpretations of automobile culture - Illustrates concepts using popular culture examples that expose ideas about automobility - Shows how fewer, smaller and more environmentally friendly cars, as well as low-carbon transport modes, are more socially attractive

Road accidents are the major cause of death and injury among young people in the developing world, and the field of psychology can offer great insights into the many factors that are at play when we get behind the wheels of our cars. Based on data collected around the world on drivers of all age groups, Graham Hole provides an up to date picture of the realities of driving, including visual perception issues, cell phone distractions, fatigue, drugs, and the effects of aging. These insights can help explain why we crash, as well as how we achieve the amazing feat of not crashing more often than we do. In this jargon-free and very accessible book, Hole applies psychological methods and insights to this every-day experience with two audiences in mind. First, he speaks to accident investigators, who frequently rely on well-developed understandings of engineering and forensics and less insight into the psychology of the driver. Second, of course, this book will be of value to anyone interested in the application of cognitive psychology to real-world behaviors, and to anyone who drives.

These imaginative thought experiments are the inventions of one of the world's eminent brain researchers. These imaginative thought experiments are the inventions of one of the world's eminent brain researchers. They are "vehicles," a series of hypothetical, self-operating machines that exhibit increasingly intricate if not always successful or civilized "behavior." Each of the vehicles in the series incorporates the essential features of all the earlier models and along the way they come to embody aggression, love, logic, manifestations of foresight, concept formation, creative thinking, personality, and free will. In a section of extensive biological notes, Braitenberg locates many elements of his fantasy in current brain research.

This volume provides a tutorial review and evaluation of scientific research on the accuracy and reliability of eyewitness identification. The book starts with the perspective that there are a variety of conceptual and empirical problems with eyewitness identification as a form of forensic evidence, just as there are a variety of problems with other forms of forensic evidence. There is then an examination of the important results in the study of eyewitness memory and the implications of this research for psychological theory and for social and legal policy. The volume takes the perspective that research on eyewitness identification can be seen as the paradigmatic example of how psychological science can be successfully applied to real-world problems.

Over the past decades many books and essays have been written on phenomeno logical psychology. Some of these publications are historical in character and were designed to give the reader an idea of the origin, meaning, and function of phenom enological psychology and its most important trends. Others are theoretical in nature and were written to give the reader an insight into the ways in which various authors conceive of phenomenological psychology and how they attempt. to justify their views in light of the philosophical assumptions underlying their conceptions. Finally, there are a great number of publications in which the authors do not talk about phenomenological psychology, but rather try to do what was described as possible and necessary in the first two kinds of publications. Some of these at tempts to do the latter have been quite successful; in other cases the results have 1 been disappointing. This anthology contains a number of essays which I have brought together for the explicit purpose of introducing the reader to the Dutch school in phenomenological psychology. The Dutch school occupies an important place in the phenomenological move ment as a whole. Buytendijk was one of the first Dutch scholars to contribute to the field, and for several decades he remained the central figure of the school.

Design plays an increasingly larger role today in creating consumer desire for products and liking for commercial messages. However, the psychological processes involved are only partially understood. In addition, design is inherently interdisciplinary, involving (among others) important elements of aesthetics, anthropology, brand strategy, creativity, design science, engineering, graphic design, industrial design, marketing, material science, product design, and several areas within psychology. While researchers and practitioners in all of these fields seek to learn more about how and why "good" design works its magic, they may benefit from each other’s work. The chapters in this edited book bring together organizing frameworks and reviews of the relevant literatures from many of these contributing disciplines, along with recent empirical work. They cover relevant areas such as embodied cognition, processing fluency, experiential marketing, sensory marketing, visual aesthetics, and other research streams related to the impact of design on consumers. Importantly, the primary focus of these chapters is not on product design that creates functional value for the targeted consumer, but rather on how design can create the kind of emotional, experiential, hedonic, and sensory appeal that results in attracting consumers. Each chapter concludes with Implications for a theory of design as well as for designers.

This volume gives an overview of the trends in Traffic and Transport Psychology. It reflects the considerable development of the most important factors for driving a road vehicle, and the variety of international research approaches. The first part contains basic approaches and integrated models as well as general theories and their implementation into Traffic and Transport Psychology. The second part deals with the driver, especially cognition, performance, social and differential effects and impairment. Important aspects are treated, such as speed perception, reaction times, interaction, risk acceptance, aggression and gender differences. Special chapters refer to performance and fatigue. The third part focuses on safety, driver support, selection and influencing drivers by enforcement, training and programs for the rehabilitation of traffic offenders. Classic ergonomic methods are discussed as well as modern telematic devices, or trends regarding driver-assessment. In the last part, current developments are presented in relation to better mobility and the protection of the environment. Questions are asked, such as whether we could reduce the use of cars, how travel behaviour can be modified or to what extent the use of alternatives to motor vehicles benefits safety as well as the environment. This work is not only important for psychologists. It should be read by all transport professionals interested in the application of psychology to traffic.

While the individual benefits of car-based travel continues to be recognized, the wider environmental and social cost of automobiles is also significant. This title evaluates the evidence for better understanding 'what drives us to drive'.

How do we define thinking? Is it simply memory, perception and motor activity or perhaps something more complex such as reasoning and decision making? This book argues that thinking is an intricate mix of all these things and a very specific coordination of cognitive resources. Divided into three key sections, there are chapters on the organization of human thought, general reasoning and thinking and behavioural outcomes of thinking. These three overarching themes provide a broad theoretical framework with which to explore wider issues in cognition and cognitive psychology and there are chapters on motivation and language plus a strong focus on problem solving, reasoning and decision making – all of which are central to a solid understanding of this field. The book also explores the cognitive processes behind perception and memory, how we might differentiate expertise from skilled, competent performance and the interaction between language, culture and thought.