The effect of dual training on the hazard response and attention allocation of novice drivers when driving with advanced driver assistance system

Abstract

To ensure traffic safety when driving with an advanced driving assistance system (ADAS), drivers are still required to take over control of the vehicle in case of emergency. Drivers’ takeover performance jointly relies on their capability to anticipate the potential hazards in traffic scenarios and an appropriate understanding of ADAS capabilities. However, previous research mostly focused on strengthening drivers’ understanding of ADAS capabilities but ignored drivers’ hazard perception capabilities when using ADAS – the latter is especially weak among novice drivers. This study proposed and evaluated three training methods for novice drivers, i.e., ADAS training only (AD training), hazard perception training only (HP training), and AD+HP training. Their effectiveness on drivers’ attention allocation strategies and responses to hazardous scenarios when handling hazardous scenarios with different levels of complexity were evaluated among 32 novice drivers in a driving simulator study. Results show that the proposed AD+HP training outperformed AD training and HP training in terms of attention allocation strategies (i.e., wider distribution of attention) and responses in hazardous scenarios (i.e., quicker and more attention to cues of importance and larger minimum time gap). However, the effectiveness of all kinds of training was weakened in more complex scenarios. Findings from this study provide insights into driver training in the context of driving automation.