Analysis of Pedal Operation in Posture of Look Back Using Car Driving Simulator with Head-mounted Display

Although the number of traffic accidents has been decreasing in recent years, the number of automobile accidents caused by pedal error has remained at a certain rate. However, the mechanism of the occurrence of such accidents has not been revealed. By using a driving simulator, it is possible to obtain driving behavior data related to pedal errors safely and efficiently, which may help to investigate the mechanism of these incidents. It is considered that an automobile driving simulator with head-mounted display can reproduce more realistic driving behaviors without any discomfort than a conventional simulator that presents images on a planar display. A head-mounted display with a head-tracking function enables the user to observe all directions of the field of view in response to the movement of the head, which results in a highly immersive image presentation. In this study, we analyzed the effects of changes in driving posture of look back on pedal operation, focusing on the accelerator and brake pedal operations.