Driving with shared control: How support system performance impacts safety
Résumé
Driving with shared control systems has been shown to be efficient in reducing collisions during a lane change. However, the ability of the current shared control systems is limited and their absolute reliability is not assured. The goal of this study is to determine how changes in system performance affect human-machine cooperation and safety. An experiment using a driving simulator was designed to compare two types of support systems, (1) haptic shared control that provides control guidance to resists hazardous lane changes; and (2) mixed-input control that autonomously controls vehicle directions to prevent lane change collisions. Both systems were examined under three conditions: (i) 100% reliability, (ii) full reliability but limited system ability, and (iii) system failure. While both systems were judged trustworthy and accepted by the drivers when fully reliable, the mixed-input was more efficient at maintaining safety. In the second condition, drivers overestimating the capabilities of the system led to more collisions for both systems. The results illustrate that how machine failure impacts surprises and distrust in automation is highly dependent on driver's ability to regain the control. Overall, the haptic guidance was more efficient and accepted more by the drivers.