The iconography of vehicle automation—a focus group study
DOI: 10.1007/s42454-021-00034-2
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Summary
This study addresses the critical safety issue of mode confusion in semi-autonomous (SAE Level 2) and conditionally autonomous (SAE Level 3) vehicles. As these vehicles become widely available, their in-vehicle displays must communicate complex automation states to drivers. However, the authors identified a significant lack of consistency in icon design across different manufacturers, with varying shapes and colors used to convey identical messages. This inconsistency poses risks to trust, performance, and safety, as mode awareness is essential for safe operation. The research aims to evaluate how users interpret these non-standardized icons and to argue for the introduction of new ISO standard icons to mitigate ambiguity and cross-vehicle incompatibility. To investigate this, the researchers conducted a focus group study involving seven participants recruited from three distinct age groups (18–34, 35–56, and 56–80+) to ensure demographic diversity. Participants were presented with icons from three different SAE Level 2 manufacturers, one SAE Level 3 vehicle, and two high-fidelity simulators. The methodology comprised three exercises: a written task where participants interpreted icon meanings and actions; a categorization task where participants grouped icons by function (e.g., sensing, automation capability, required driver action); and an unstructured discussion. Data were captured via video recording and transcribed, then analyzed using ISO 9186 standards for testing symbol comprehensibility, classifying responses as correct, wrong, opposite meaning, or unknown. The results revealed significant ambiguity in user interpretations. While most participants correctly identified icons indicating active automation, particularly those using green coloring, interpretations of inactive or ending automation modes were highly inconsistent. Some participants misinterpreted icons as indicating road conditions (e.g., narrow roads) rather than system status. Crucially, some participants interpreted icons inversely, believing the vehicle was in automated mode when it was not, or vice versa. The study found that participants with more experience in Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) were better at interpreting concept-related icons, whereas those with less experience struggled, often interpreting pictorial elements literally. Color usage was a major point of confusion; while green was generally accepted as "active/safe," blue, white, and grey were viewed as ambiguous, and red was inconsistently applied across manufacturers. The study concludes that the current lack of standardization in automation icons creates dangerous ambiguity that can lead to mode confusion and potential accidents. The authors emphasize that while well-designed icons can transcend language barriers, the current divergence in design increases cognitive workload and error rates. The findings support the urgent need for new ISO standard icons specifically for SAE Level 2 and 3 automation modes. Standardization would enhance safety by ensuring consistent communication across vehicles, reducing the risk of drivers failing to intervene when necessary or intervening unnecessarily. The paper advocates for iterative design processes involving end-users to develop icons that are universally understood and culturally compatible.
Provenance
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| Stage | Outcome | Tool | Model | Prompt | Attempts | Completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| discover | success | Crossref | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| archive | success | canonical_url | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| extract | success | pdftotext | — | — | 4 | 2026-08-10 |
| clean | success | clean | — | — | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
| chunk | success | chunk | — | — | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
| embed | success | embed | Qwen/Qwen3-Embedding-8B | — | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
| promote | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| summarize | success | llm | qwen3.6-27b-nvidia | summ-v5 | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
| tag | success | vector_similarity | — | — | 17 | 2026-08-11 |
| verify | partial | — | — | — | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-nvidia on 2026-08-10; verification: verified_with_issues.
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- Applied Guidance: design guidelines
- Theoretical Contribution: conceptual framework