The effects of conveying declarative knowledge on user attitudes and driving performance when using a conditional...

This study explored a challenge of incorporate declarative knowledge-know what-to driving automation's user education. We focused on an improvement of user attitudes and trust that would contribute to user comprehension and performance, particularly in elderly. A three-factor (instruction, age, test scene) mixed-effects driving-simulator experiment was designed. Twenty-six young (< 55 years old) and 24 elderly (≥ 65 years old) were randomly divided into instructed and uninstructed groups. The results demonstrated that the instruction contributed a 10.5% increase in safely taking over car control and encouraged users to understand how to use a system. Meanwhile, instructed drivers appeared less hesitant to resume control from the system, particularly elderly drivers. However, no significant effect was shown on the response time and steering behaviour. These findings can be used to develop more efficient public education, particularly for the elderly, which is expected to advance user comprehension and operation of driving automation.