Public Perceptions of Vehicle Headlamps: Visibility and Glare

Recent technological developments have begun to add a number of new configurations for vehicle forward lighting to the realm of possibility, including high-intensity discharge and light-emitting diode headlamps, and adaptive forward-lighting systems. These systems can offer substantial differences in performance and appearance from conventional filament-based headlamps that have been ubiquitous for many decades. These differences have not gone unnoticed by the U.S. driving public. A review of newspaper articles published during the past several years was conducted in order to assess public perceptions of vehicle headlamps in terms of their ability to support visibility and their impacts on headlamp glare. This review identifies some important misconceptions about headlamps that could be corrected through effective educational means, and also identifies areas of refinement and focus for fruitful research that could increase the benefit and impact of effective forward lighting systems and technologies.