Abstract
The risk of car accidents caused by older adults having drivers’ licenses is increasing in the current super-aging society. Dementia and cognitive function disorders in older drivers inhibit safe driving. Moreover, cognitive functions decline with aging. Therefore, in Japan, high-risk strategies to deal with older drivers with suspected mild dementia have been developed. Future perspectives of preventing traffic accidents caused by older drivers are discussed based on the findings of studies, including national-wide cohort studies, on older drivers. In the discussion, the concept of prevention in public health studies, and the idea of hierarchical behavior control in psychology are considered, and models of human behavior for decreasing the risk of traffic accidents are evaluated.
