“Pay attention to that aggressive vehicle”: The effect of Aggressive Vehicle Warning Systems on driving behavior and perceived workload

Abstract

Aggressive driving is a common issue in daily life and brings negative impacts on traffic efficiency and road safety. Advances in connected vehicle technology facilitate vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication and allow drivers to better understand the intentions and behaviors of surrounding vehicles, providing new ideas for addressing the challenges posed by aggressive driving. In a driving simulator experiment, the present study aimed to explore the effect of aggressive vehicle warning systems (AVWSs) on driving behavior and perceived workload during hazard events. AVWSs access vehicles’ driving styles based on their past behaviors and present visual-auditory messages when it perceives the driving style of a nearby vehicle as aggressive. Eighteen drivers participated in the experiment and were randomly assigned to two groups, one with messages from the AVWS (AVWS group) and the other without messages (baseline group). Each driver experienced three types of hazard events caused by surrounding aggressive vehicles: braking, lane-changing, and traffic rules violations at intersections. The results indicated that the AVWS could orient drivers’ attention to the aggressive vehicle in advance, thereby reducing their risk of being involved in collisions in unpredictable intersection events and reducing their response time in emergency braking events. Drivers in the AVWS group also perceived a lower level of mental workload and frustration than those in the baseline group when experiencing hazard events. However, caution should be taken when there are conflicts between the message and the actual situation, such as vehicles with non-aggressive driving styles exhibiting aggressive driving behavior. The findings of this study may provide some implications for the design of driving assistance systems, especially in intelligent vehicles.

Keywords: Connected vehicle, Aggressive vehicle warning systems, Driving behavior, Perceived workload

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1005228