Handbook of Driving Simulation for Engineering, Medicine, and Psychology

The Future of Driving Simulation

Authors
Peter A. Hancock, University of Central Florida
Thomas B. Sheridan, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Abstract
The Past to Present. The simulation of the driving experience has been used for both research and most especially for driver training. In large part, the state of the art in driving simulation has been contingent upon wider developments in simulation science. The challenge of ground-vehicle simulation provides stiffer challenges than simulation of airborne vehicles. Current advances have seen high-fidelity, multi-million-dollar facilities. The advantage is that they provide capacities now coming very close to the Turing test for simulated reality. The disadvantage is that they are so expensive as to be almost unique and so no replicable science is conducted on them. The Present to the Near Future. Simulation not only improves with the technical capacities of the age, it also diversifies. Thus, in modern simulations there are options associated with game-playing, full virtual environments, and augmented forms of reality as well as improvements on the traditional fixed and motion-based facilities. We anticipate that such branches of development will further diversify as new and innovative methods of rendering surrogate surroundings continue to proliferate. Worlds to Come. The fundamental function of simulation is to augment current reality with programmable objects or entities or to replace the whole environments with a surrogate experience. However, our whole world of experience is represented in the brain. Thus, all external technologies only serve to generate a pattern of brain stimulation. Our further future is thus headed toward direct brain stimulation. External facilities of the sort we see today at the most advanced facilities will be replaced by direct brain stimulation portable packages. Dangerously, one will be able to chose one’s own reality and may therefore become confused about just what reality is. At such a juncture simulation and reality may no longer be distinguishable. Thus, the end point of all forms of simulation will be a philosophical paradox.

Keywords
Driving Simulation, Future Trends, Augmented Reality, Driver Modeling, Virtual Reality

Key Points
• Driving simulation has been used for research and training.
• The development of driving simulation has been contingent on the development of flight simulation.
• Modern technologies have largely dissociated this dependence.
• Such technical capacities not only enhance simulation they diversify it.
• Crucial forms of driver simulation can now be achieved by augmented forms of reality.
• Gradually, all simulations evolve toward the threshold of the Turing Test for reality.
• Passing such a threshold poses fundamental questions about the nature of reality itself.
• Creating surrogate realities may therefore not always be beneficial or even moral.

Web Resources
Web Figures 4.1-4.10. (click for all)

Web Figure 4.1: The National Advanced Driving Simulator (NADS) of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, housed in Iowa City, Iowa. At present, this is probably the most advanced facility in the world for driving simulation. (Reprinted with permission of NADS). (Cover version of Figure 4.1).

Web Figure 4.2: The VTI driving simulator in Linkoping, Sweden. This also is one of the most advanced, state-of-the-art motion-based driving simulators in the world. (Color version of Figure 4.2). (Photograph: P.A. Hancock, reproduced by permission of VTI).

Web Figure 4.3: The original Link Trainer or “blue box” as it was affectionately known. Although there is no true motion base per se, the facility did sit on a platform which provided some movement (Figure 4.3).

Web Figure 4.4: Road scene viewed directly through semi-transparent mirror (Head-Up Display) (Figure 4.4).

Web Figure 4.5: Optical-see-through approach with a head-mounted display (HMD) (Figure 4.5).

Web Figure 4.6: Video mixed-image approach with vehicle-mounted display (Figure 4.6).

Web Figure 4.7: Video mixed-image approach with head-mounted display (Figure 4.7).

Web Figure 4.8: Full VR approach with Head-Mounted Display (Figure 4.8).

Web Figure 4.9: Two images from a video clip of the driver’s display in a test maneuver in a school parking lot. A (virtual) truck approaches in a near head-on collision. The driver swerves his (actual) vehicle. The background is the real environment. The traffic cones were used as fiduciary landmarks (Figure 4.9).

Web Figure 4.10: Two images from a video clip of the driver’s display in test maneuver on a country road. A (virtual) truck approaches from the right in a near collision and the driver brakes. The background is the real environment. The white signs on the trees were used as fiduciary landmarks (Figure 4.10).

Key Readings
Clark, A. (1997). Being there: Putting brain, body and world together again. Boston, MA: MIT Press.

Hancock, P. A. (2008). The future of simulation. In D. Vicenzi, J. Wise, M. Mouloua, & P. A. Hancock (Eds.), Human factors in simulation and training (pp. 169–188). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.

Hancock, P. A., and de Ridder, S. (2003). Behavioral response in accident-likely situations. Ergonomics, 46(12), 1111–1135.

Ness, J. W., Tepe, V., and Ritzer, D. R. (Eds.). (2004). The science and simulation of human performance. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Sheridan, T. B. (2002). Humans and automation: System design and research issues. John Wiley & Sons.