Guiding Driver Visual Attention with LEDs

Previous research has shown that drivers benefit from directional warnings in early warning situations. To be effective, early warnings must support the driver to easily identify potential hazards. We investigated LEDs at the bottom of the windshield to guide the driver's visual attention to target stimuli to support an artificial visual discrimination task. We varied the patterns of LED illumination. The patterns included either the illumination of single LEDs or sequentially illuminated LEDs generating the illusion of movement towards the target LED. Additionally, we compared flashing against constant illumination of the target LEDs. The results showed that participants reacted 200-450 ms faster and produced up to 4 times fewer errors to sequential patterns. Flashing the target LED segment led to slower reactions with more errors than constant illumination. We showed that drivers' attention can be directed efficiently and effectively with simple hardware and well-designed illumination patterns.