PROVUS? DISCREPANCY EVALUATION OF THE DRIVESMART NOVICE DRIVER CD-ROM TRAINING PRODUCT

The Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) recently completed a research program culminating in the development of a CD-ROM based training product, known as DriveSmart, designed to accelerate in young novice drivers the development of perceptual and cognitive skills known to be important in reducing crash risk. While the use of traditional research strategies to evaluate a training product can provide important measures of instructional effectiveness, these strategies do not necessarily provide the type of information needed to identify and remedy specific flaws in the product. Provus? Discrepancy Approach is an alternative strategy for evaluating educational programs where performance standards are established, evidence of compliance with these standards is gathered, discrepancies with standards are identified, and corrective actions are taken. This paper discusses the application of Provus? Discrepancy Approach to the evaluation of DriveSmart, focussing on the identification of discrepancies with the standards, and the changes which were made to the product as a result.