Road signs: walking among shapes and colors

Road signs provide information through the combination of three elements: shape, color and pictogram. The current road signs are projected to ensure safety but are designed for adults and not for children. Kids are not small adults and they have a different perception of reality. While planning of home-school pedestrian routes, it is necessary to create road signs that are comprehensible for children aged 6-14. Therefore the elements of road signs were studied individually. The study revealed that both the knowledge of geometric shapes and colors perception are closely related to age and culture and to the teachings which children are submitted to. In fact, some geometric shapes, like the circle, are perfectly recognized from childhood and others less so, such as the rectangle. Moreover children are attracted to basic colors but they are aware of the existence of pastel colors only with teaching. Finally, pictogram must represent a simple symbol that is easily recognized especially from far away. The message generated by the three elements is understandable by children. In fact, children overcome the phase of syncretism after the age of 6, which corresponds to the phase in which children are unable to analyses and syntheses. The result of the research has allowed to design road signs, both vertical and horizontal, that are able to ensure the safety of home-school routes. A road signs study was conducted for Cagliari’s project on road safety. This project involves the use of questionnaires to verify if the road signs are properly designed.