Impact of traffic environment and cognitive workload on older drivers’ behavior in simulated driving

Abstract

As the use of in-vehicle technologies became more popular, there is concern about a concomitant increase in driver distraction arising from their use. While the introduction of voice recognition systems is intended to reduce the distraction due to manual operation of these units, a significant proportion of the distraction associated with their use may arise not from the manual manipulation but rather the cognitive consequences. It is also known that the risk of inattentive driving varies with age. In this study, the impact of cognitive workload and traffic environments on older drivers' behavior was investigated in a driving simulator. To assess the impact of advancing age on driving performance degradation under a dual task condition, the performance of 63 drivers, divided into younger (20-29) and older (60-69) age groups, was evaluated. The authors also considered driving behavioral differences in the context of urban and highway driving, appropriately counterbalanced. At a specified location in the two scenarios, subjects were asked to complete a series of auditory tasks of increasing complexity. Comparisons of younger and older drivers' driving performance, including forward velocity, speed control, standard deviation of lane position and steering wheel reversal rate, were conducted. Results indicated that age and traffic environment impact both driving performance and compensatory behavior during dual task conditions.

Does cognitive distraction improve or degrade lane keeping performance? Analysis of time-to-line crossing safety margins

“…This indicates drivers tend to take more micro-steering movements when engaged in a cognitive load task, and this type of activity increased with the level of cognitive load. This finding was also consistent with results from previous studies (Engström et al, 2005;Son et al, 2011). Gaze concentration: There was a significant main effect of task demand (F(2.23, 55.8) =8.093, p=0.001, =0.245) on gaze concentration, as shown in Fig.…”

“…On the other hand, many studies indicate that cognitive distraction leads to a reduction in the vehicle's standard deviation of lateral position (SDLP), but there is currently a divergence in views regarding whether such reductions should be interpreted as impaired (Mehler, Reimer, Coughlin, & Dusek, 2009;Reimer, 2009) or improved (Engström, Johansson, & Östlund, 2005;He, McCarley, & Kramer, 2014;He & McCarley, 2011;Jamson et al, 2005;Kaber, Liang, Zhang, Rogers, & Gangakhedkar, 2012;Liang et al, 2010;Son, Lee, & Kim, 2011) driving performance. In addition, studies have found this reduction in SDLP to be accompanied by a higher gaze concentration towards the road centre (Cooper, Medeiros-Ward, & Strayer, 2013;Victor, Harbluk, & Engstrom, 2005;Wang, Reimer, Dobres, & Mehler, 2014), which is thought to be a possible reason for this reduction in SDLP (Boer, Spyridakos, Markkula, & Merat, 2016;Liang et al, 2010;Victor et al, 2005), though, again, the relationship between these two particular metrics is not currently understood.…”

“…Investigations on drivers' steering control show that cognitive distraction increases microsteering activity (Engström et al, 2005;Son et al, 2011), results in higher steering entropy (Boer, Rakauskas, Ward, & Goodrich, 2005;Kountouriotis, Spyridakos, Carsten, & Merat, 2016), increased micro-steering reversal rate, and higher steering wheel acceleration . This finding has also been regarded as the direct reason for the diminished SDLP (Engstrom et al, 2017;He et al, 2014).…”

Synchronising Physiological and Behavioural Sensors in a Driving Simulator

“…The most popular devices utilised include electroencephalogram (EEG) sensors and the eye trackers or front camera, due to their high sensitivity and convenience for live monitoring [2], [3]. Heart rate and skin conductance level were considered reflective of cognitive load changes, and in many studies they were studied together [4], [5]. Many devices are capable of monitoring electrocardiogram (ECG) and measuring skin conductance (GSR) at the same time, such as the commonly used Vitaport Temec BV, MEDAC or Procomp Infiniti.…”

The MIT AgeLab n-back

“…In addition to studies conducted at the AgeLab, the task has been used extensively internationally as a method of inducing graded levels of cognitive workload with studies such as [1,2,4,5,6,7,13,21,23,24,26,30] being conducted utilizing the English version of the task or translations into French, German, Chinese, Japanese, Swedish, Korean, and Polish. Various translations of materials provided by international research teams can be found at http://agelab.mit.edu/study-tools.…”