Driving Behavior during Takeover Request of Autonomous Vehicle: Effect of Driver Postures

We investigated the effect of driver posture on driving control following a takeover request (TOR) from autonomous to manual driving in level 3 autonomous vehicles. When providing a TOR, driving behaviors need to be investigated to develop driver monitoring systems, and it is important to clarify the effect of driver postures. Experiments were conducted using driver postures that are likely to be adopted in autonomous driving. Driver postures were set based on combinations of two types of upper-body posture and three types of foot posture. The driver’s upper body and head were set to either a forward or sideways orientation. For each of these there were three types of foot posture: both feet on the floor, crossed legs, and cross-legged sitting. Following a TOR, we compared the braking and steering maneuvers of subjects driving normally and examined the effects of posture on driver reaction time. The results show that both the upper-body and foot postures of the driver affect the steering and braking reaction time. The driver monitoring system should be able to detect posture and activate a TOR warning, and detection times up to 2 and 1.3 times faster than those for normal postures should be considered for different upper-body and foot postures, respectively.