Journal of Ergonomics
Open Access

Abstract

The Advantage of Adapting a Driver Support System to the Prevailing Road Condition – Adaptive Versus Non Adaptive Forward Collision Warning

Magnus Hjälmdahl and Birgitta Thorslund VTI

There is a great potential safety benefit of warning the driver for an imminent collision by the use of a Forward Collision Warning system. However, the systems that are tested and even introduced on the market today do not adapt to the prevailing road condition which might lead to problems when the road is slippery and the braking distance is longer. In this study, which was undertaken in the VTI driving simulator, the benefits of a system that is adaptive to the friction on the road compared to a system that does not consider friction was investigated with regard to driver behaviour, safety, acceptance and trust in the system. The results showed that there were great safety benefits of the adaptive system in terms of fewer collisions, longer minimum headway, and longer time to collision. The downside of the adaptive system was that it had a lower acceptance among the drivers. The reason for this is probably due to the fact that the system is more difficult to learn and that the number of perceived false and early warnings is higher. Further work has to be carried out to recognize how to reduce the number of these warnings, fostering improved acceptance.