Windsor, Ontario — A study by a kinesiology professor at the University of Windsor has found that drivers are frequently distracted when behind the wheel of semi-autonomous vehicles.
“We suspected this would be the case, but it was much worse than we anticipated,” said associate professor Francesco Biondi.
Biondi hooked up special headgear to 30 volunteers as they drove a 2022 Tesla Model 3 on Hwy. 401 to Chatham and back in both the manual and the L2 autonomous modes.
Headgear was used to track the eye movements of the drivers as well as pupil dilation and blink rates. Drivers also wore heart monitors and a device that sensed hand-eye reaction time.
Cameras recorded the drivers’ head movements as well as what was happening on the road both in front and behind the vehicle.
“They started paying less attention to the road, more attention to the massive touch screen, and they started looking elsewhere, not at the forward roadway, but side glance and looking at the other sides for much longer than in the manual mode,” Biondi said.
Biondi even noted that one test driver fell asleep while in the semi-autonomous mode. A research assistant was in the vehicle with the driver at the time to help ensure that drivers did not text or fall asleep, but Biondi wonders what would have happened if she hadn’t been there.
“Imagine what they would do if they were left free to do whatever they want with their phones or with the touch screen,” he said.
Biondi says he believes that semi-autonomous vehicles are dangerous and have not lived up to the hype about how much safer they are.
“We’ve been promised for many, many years that these cars would be much safer than human drivers. But so far, the evidence is not showing that,” said Biondi.
Meanwhile, the executive director of the mobility partnerships and innovation with Invest WindsorEssex said technology exists that can keep the drivers focused on the road.
“There could be vibrations within the seats, or within the steering wheels themselves. There could be full modes where the vehicle can just pull over to the side of the road until that individual’s been rested well enough to get back onto the road itself,” said Matthew Johnson.
Biondi is calling on more study in Canada, as has been done in the U.S., and also better training for drivers.
