Design and evaluation of steering protection for avoiding collisions during a lane change

Abstract

This paper discusses the design of a driver assistance system for avoiding collisions with vehicles in blind spots. The following three types of support systems are compared: (1) a warning system that provides the driver with an auditory alert, (2) a ‘soft’ protection system that makes the steering wheel stiffer to tell the driver that a lane-change manoeuvre is not recommended and (3) a ‘hard’ protection system that cancels the driver's input and controls the tyre angle autonomously to prevent lane departure. The results of an experiment showed that the hard protection system was more effective for collision avoidance than either the warning or the soft protection system. The warning and soft protection systems were almost the same in terms of collision avoidance. The results suggest that the human-centred automation principle, which requires the human to have the final authority over the automation, can be violated depending on the context.

Abstract

Practitioner Summary: This paper compared three types of driver assistance systems for avoiding collisions with vehicles in blind spots: a warning system, soft protection system and hard protection system. The ‘hard’ protection system was the most effective for maintaining safety and was as readily accepted by drivers as the soft protection system was.

Keywords::

• adaptive automation
• protection
• safety
• advanced driver assistance systems
• lane change

Acknowledgement

The authors thank Yoshitomo Nagai for his help in conducting the experiment and the data analysis.