Ability to Handle Unfamiliar Systems in Passenger Cars According to Driver Skills
¹Czech University of Life Sciences, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Technological Equipment of Building, Kamýcká 129, CZ 16521 Praha 6, Czech Republic
²Czech University of Life Sciences, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Vehicles and Ground Transport, Kamýcká 129, CZ 165 21 Praha 6, Czech Republic
*Correspondence: jabko@tf.czu.cz
Abstract:
This paper addresses the ability of drivers to intuitively control special passenger car systems that they have as yet not encountered in the course of their driving practice and therefore have no experience of them. The study described in this paper was conducted on a sample group of drivers without any prior experience of the tested model or of any other model of the same brand, and the functions and systems selected for testing were unique for the brand and model in question. The reason for conduction of this study was the endeavour to recreate the common situation in which a driver is forced to drive a car with whose controls he/she has not yet had the opportunity to become acquainted. Based on statistical evaluation of the obtained data, it proved that the initial hypothesis claiming the existence of a correlation between driver parameters such as age, gender or length and quality of driver experience and his/her ability to adapt to completely unknown car control systems could be confirmed. The results in this paper may be applied in the cabin and car control system design process, thereby enhancing the user-friendliness of passenger car controls, thereby also indirectly increasing road traffic safety.
Key words:
ergonomics, Evaluating, Experience, Information systems, Safety, vehicle