Abstract Roads are often crowded places which many people would like to use at the same time. We unpack the ways in which drivers coordinate their vehicles’ movements and how they come to agreement on the sharing of the road space. The drivers have to sort this out even though, they are confined within the shells of their vehicles, and often meet other drivers for only a short span of time. Obviously the availability of a set of formal traffic rules makes interaction easier. Furthermore, there are a number of informal rules, which in some sense prescribe how to behave given the shape of the roads and the relations between vehicles, and rules which draw on the identities of the drivers. The availability of several rule sets, and the possibility to interpret the context of a road setting in various ways, make misunderstanding of other drivers’ activities possible. Therefore, we cannot take rule following as an explanation as to why most of the time people manage to coordinate their movements, without crashing into each other. We need to investigate the details of how, e.g. traffic regulations, are actually used in naturally occurring interaction out on the streets. We introduce the notion of situated interaction to account for how agreements are negotiated as a local activity. Such negotiations must, of course, be finalized in seconds, since there is little room for more sustained forms of interaction. If situated interaction plays an important role in traffic it will have implications for how the information technology for coordination should be designed.


    Access

    Check access

    Check availability in my library

    Order at Subito €


    Export, share and cite



    Title :

    Traffic as Situated Interaction


    Contributors:


    Publication date :

    2010-01-01


    Size :

    13 pages





    Type of media :

    Article/Chapter (Book)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English




    Capacity and traffic conditions at unsignalised intersection approaches situated in traffic signal networks

    Chodur, J. / Gaca, S. / Gondek, S. et al. | British Library Conference Proceedings | 1994



    Tacit and Situated Knowledge

    Karrenbrock, Anne / Brendel, Laura / Popplow, Laura | BASE | 2024

    Free access

    Situated learning of visual robotic behaviors

    Narayanan, Krishna Kumar / Posada, Luis-Felipe / Hoffmann, Frank et al. | TIB AV-Portal | 2011

    Free access

    Strategic C3I Systems as Situated Action

    O'Neill, J. / Defence Science and Technology Organisation; Special Interest Group in Artificial Intelligence | British Library Conference Proceedings | 1997