Many new in-vehicle systems focus on accident prevention by providing assistance to the driver during the driving task. This article reports on a study in which an experiment was conducted to determine the effects of an in-vehicle collision avoidance warning system (IVCAWS) on driver performance. The study included 135 licensed drivers using a driving simulator; 120 of these received alerts from the IVCAWS when their headway to a lead car was less than 2 seconds, and the other 15 (control group) received no alerts. The alert interfaces include auditory, visual, and multimodal options. The results show that alerted drivers spent less time in the danger zone than did those who did not receive alerts from the system. Women responded more readily to the alerts than men. Drivers were mostly able to distinguish between false and true alerts. However, an increase in the number of false alarms led to an increase in the percentage of false responses (braking when not in the danger zone). The authors also address concern about overreliance on an IVCAWS, as well as the issue of driver annoyance with the alert mechanism.
Abstract