Emotion Induction Strategies in Driving Simulator for Validated Experiments

Abstract

Triggering emotions in a driving simulator is not easy as the virtual environment reduces the reality of the situations. This contribution deals with the induction of emotions in drivers during the simulation and addresses the possible hindrances in the design and implementation phases. For this purpose, an experiment is conducted on a driving simulator with 20 participants, 5 females and 15 males, aged 22 to 30 years old. First, important emotions that may recur in driving situations are presented. Then, the process of evoking emotions in drivers is clarified, three different strategies, namely monotonous, event-driven, and combination, are described, and the intensity of emotion evoked by each modality of the stimuli is examined. In addition, a mapping from three-dimensional to discrete emotion space including seven states is presented. Finally, to evaluate the concepts discussed, the results regarding driver emotion and scenario validation are presented and general recommendations are provided.