Work zone crashes and fatalities have been decreasing since 1994. Yet, according to Fatality Analysis Reporting System, 667 people were killed in highway work zone crashes in 2009. As the United States’ infrastructure ages and new roads and highways are constructed less frequently, the need for repairs and alterations to the nation’s roadways is continually increasing. This growth ensures that work zones will be a vital piece of design focus in the near future. In order to continue the decreasing trend in work zone crashes, and reduce the still significant number of work zone fatalities, work zones need to continually be examined to identify opportunities for improved safety. This research explored the relationship between work zone related crashes and work zone design and setup. More specifically, existing literature and current standards, compiled with crash report form data in the UMass Safety Data Warehouse and field observations in Massachusetts were integrated to determine the causes and remedies for work zone related crashes. The research examined three critical areas: 1) causation of work zone related crashes in contrast to non-work zone related crashes along with variations of citations as a result of work zone crashes; 2) variations of the work zone definition and the impact on work zone involvement; and 3) analysis of conflict and event studies for small scale work zones to develop a methodology using surrogate measures to identify potential countermeasures leading to improved work zone safety. The results are expected to advance the current state of knowledge with regards to work zone design and setup, resulting in recommended actions for improved work zone analysis and design strategies.

Response inhibition and the ability to navigate distracting information are both integral parts of cognitive control and are imperative to adaptive behavior in everyday life. Thus far, research has only inconclusively been able to draw inferences regarding the association between response stopping and the effects of interfering information. Using a novel combination of the Simon task and a stop signal task, the current study set out to investigate the behavioral as well as the neurophysiological underpinnings of the relationship between response stopping and interference processing. We tested n = 27 healthy individuals and combined temporal EEG signal decomposition with source localization methods to delineate the precise neurophysiological dynamics and functional neuroanatomical structures associated with conflict effects on response stopping. The results showed that stopping performance was compromised by conflicts. Importantly, these behavioral effects were reflected by specific aspects of information coded in the neurophysiological signal, indicating that conflict effects during response stopping are not mediated via purely perceptual processes. Rather, it is the processing of specific, stop-relevant stimulus features in the sensory regions during response selection, which underlies the emergence of conflict effects in response stopping. The findings connect research regarding response stopping with overarching theoretical frameworks of perception–action integration.