Ambient light based interaction concept for an integrative driver assistance system – a driving simulator study

For today’s vehicles several advanced driver assistance systems are on the market supporting the driver in critical driving situations or automating parts of the driving tasks. In the future there will be even more. Currently, those assistance systems do not use a common and consistent interaction strategy to communicate with the driver. The goal of the present study is to present and to evaluate a concept using ambient light for presenting information of different assistance systems in an integrated way. Research on visual peripheral warnings showed positive effects on driver reaction times in demanding situations. This paper presents results of a driving simulator experiment, in which an ambient light concept using peripheral visual perception were tested. A 360° LED stripe was installed around the driver in a fixed-based driving simulator providing interaction signals via peripheral vision. The developed ambient light display should support the driver in different driving situations by a consistent colour-coded interaction design. In a between-group design 41 participants (21 with and 20 without ambient light) drove eight different highway scenarios to test the display. Results of the ambient light interaction design regarding driver reactions and subjective evaluation regarding comprehensibility of the ambient light concept are reported and discussed.