A driving simulator study on the perception of distances in situations of car-following and overtaking

Bergeron, Jacques; Baumberger, Bernard; Paquette, Martin; Flückiger, Michelangelo; Delorme, André · 2006 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.2495/ut060431

archive: archived pipeline: cataloged verified

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Summary

This study investigates how drivers perceive and control distances during car-following and overtaking maneuvers, specifically examining the influence of target vehicle speed, inter-vehicle distance, and driver experience. Accurate distance estimation is critical for safe driving, yet real-world testing is hazardous and difficult to control. Consequently, the researchers utilized a driving simulator to evaluate how subjects position their vehicles relative to other cars in static and dynamic contexts. A secondary objective was to determine whether driving experience significantly affects performance in these complex perceptual tasks. The experiment employed a fixed-base driving simulator featuring a full-size vehicle cab with realistic force feedback and projected road scenes. Fourteen participants (seven men and seven women, aged 20–56) with varying levels of driving experience (2.5 to 32 years) completed three tasks. First, subjects stopped their vehicle at an equal distance between two static cars separated by either 34.5 or 54.5 meters. Second and third, they performed overtaking maneuvers by positioning their vehicle midway between two preceding cars moving at 40 or 60 km/h, with the same separation distances. The simulator recorded positioning errors, defined as the deviation from the midpoint between the target vehicles. Results indicated that subjects consistently underestimated distances across all conditions. Performance was significantly better when target vehicles were static compared to when they were moving. Among moving conditions, drivers were more accurate at 60 km/h than at 40 km/h. Additionally, estimation accuracy improved when the distance between the target vehicles was smaller (34.5 m vs. 54.5 m). Statistical analysis revealed that positioning error was influenced by speed and distance, with errors ranging from 12.1% to 22.5% of the inter-vehicle distance depending on the speed condition. Crucially, driving experience emerged as the most significant individual variable differentiating performance, with more experienced drivers demonstrating better distance estimation capabilities. The findings suggest that dynamic environments impose greater perceptual constraints than static ones, leading to increased error rates. The counterintuitive result that performance improved at higher speeds (60 km/h vs. 40 km/h) may indicate that drivers perceive less need for precision at slower speeds or greater distances. The strong correlation between driving experience and performance underscores the importance of accumulated practice in mastering spatial judgments during car-following and overtaking. These results highlight the complexity of distance perception in driving and support the use of simulators for studying visual-motor coordination in traffic scenarios.

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Topics

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• speed distance perception
• following distance
• situational awareness

Information type

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• Empirical Findings: behavioral performance data
• Methodological Resource: tool software
• Theoretical Contribution: computational model