Objective: The objective of this study is to compare the driver"s response rate and time between auditory and tactile signals given in two different task conditions (Driving/Non-Driving). It is for checking whether haptic signals can be used as a comp...
Objective: The objective of this study is to compare the driver"s response rate and time between auditory and tactile signals given in two different task conditions (Driving/Non-Driving). It is for checking whether haptic signals can be used as a component of the car warning system. Background: As recent automobiles are evolving into intelligent information systems everyday, the amount of information that drivers need to process increase correspondingly. Too much information presented simultaneously on visual displays may distract driver’s attention and it may cause serious traffic accidents. It is hypothesized that multimodal in-vehicle information systems can be a possible solution for reducing the driver’s cognitive overload. Method: Experiment were conducted to gather response rate and time for given warning signals delivered in different modalities, auditory and tactile, using a computerized interactive driving simulator. The subjects are tested under two different task conditions: driving and non-driving. Response rate and time for the haptic signals are compared with those for the auditory signals. Conclusion: The study shows that there is slight difference in response rate between the two modalities, but the difference is not practically significant. For response time, auditory signals draw faster responses compare to the haptic signals in 73msec on the average. Application: The result from this study supports that haptic signals can be used as substitute warnings when other channels are busy and signals can be initiated a bit earlier than the situation.