Nighttime Effectiveness of Rearview Mirrors: Driver Attitudes and Behaviors

The availability of new technology for antiglare rearview mirrors has increased the importance of understanding how people react to glare from rearview mirrors and what the tradeoff between visibility and glare reduction should be. We conducted a survey of attitudes toward and use of prism mirrors to determine what guidance that information might offer for future mirror design. The major findings are that (1) there is a high level of awareness and use of prism mirrors, but (2) the benefits obtainable from the antiglare setting of the prism mirror are not fully utilized. The reasons for this suboptimal use appear to be (1) a lower than desirable level of reflectivity on the antiglare setting, and (2) failure to make the required manual adjustments of the mirror.