Your next car will almost certainly perform better than your last car, offer more features, greater comfort and more gadgets. It'll also be safer, but we've become so complacent with the safety of modern cars that we barely give it a second thought any more.

Carmakers do though, and Toyota has revealed a list of safety tech you could expect on your next Prius or Camry.

Rather than just focusing on the driver and passengers, Toyota has thought about older drivers and pedestrians, too, as recent Japanese road accident statistics have revealed that more than half of road traffic deaths are of people aged 65 and over, and pedestrians account for more fatalities than vehicle occupants.

To this end, Toyota will be fitting devices like collision-avoidance assist and a pop-up bonnet, emergency response tech and "adaptive driving beam".

So what do they do, and how do they help?

Pre-Crash Safety with collision-avoidance assist is similar to systems used by Volvo and most recently, BMW. It detects when a collision with a vehicle or pedestrian and if the driver fails to react to a situation, it automatically apllies the brakes. Future versions could even steer away from an accident.

Adaptive Driving Beam is a preventative technology that improves safety for other road users. You'll be familiar with the dazzling headlights of many modern vehicles. Toyota's tech is an adaption of automatic high and low beam switching, which now shields headlight beams from oncoming road users whilst maintaining as much light as possible for the driver.

Pop-up Hoods have been previewed before. One of the main causes of injury for pedestrians in road accidents is head injury as a result of striking hard objects beneath the hood - the engine, in other words. By raising in the event of pedestrian impact, the risk is minimised, even on low-slung, sporty vehicles.

Emergency response technology is designed to help those at risk of collapsing at the wheel. Heart attacks and black-outs can result in serious accidents, not just posing a risk to sufferers, but other road users too who might be caught up in an incident. Toyota's system monitors cardio-vascular functions through the steering wheel to detect risks early.

For more on the technologies, why not have a look at Toyota's safer driving video below?

[Toyota]