Long-term One-year Stability of Discomfort Perception in Automated Driving and Personal Influencing Factors

Abstract

Comfort is considered one of the key factors for broad public acceptance of automated driving. New comfort aspects such as familiarity with driving manoeuvres, feelings of control, and apparent safety require user-centred design approaches to ensure usage and prevent disengagement or unnecessary take-overs. One research question in this area concerns the circumstances of comfort/discomfort perception such as stability over time and individual characteristics. The present research assessed the stability of perceived discomfort in automated driving after one year as well as influencing personal factors. A total of 28 participants (15 female, 13 male), aged between 20 and 72 years, took part in two driving simulator studies with a one-year break between them. On both dates, each participant experienced two automated drives including different potentially uncomfortable driving scenarios. During all drives, a handset controller allowed to report perceived discomfort continuously and gradually from 0 to 100 by pressing the lever. Correlation analyses were performed on the mean handset values for each entire drive. The results showed high correlations between ρ = .624 and ρ = .823 over time. Summarizing the influence of personal factors, young women with a more defensive driving style, less Affinity for Technology as well as less initial trust and acceptance of automation report more discomfort, with initial trust as most important factor. Overall, discomfort perception appears to be rather stable over time. Given the strong individual and dynamic nature, selectable driving style profiles and/or discomfort-adaptive real-time systems are recommended to achieve a human-centred design solution.

Keywords: Automated Driving, Discomfort, Long-term Study, Attitudes, Personality, Handset Control, STADT:up Project

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1008146