Driver Engagement in Notifications

Abstract

Smartwatches and other wearables are being developed for the consumer market and will most likely be used by drivers, but there is little investigation into their influence on driver behaviour. Smartwatches are able to provide certain smartphone functionalities. For example, they can provide notifications, such as text mes-sages. Because watches are always “on-hand”, drivers may find it easier and be more compelled to interact with them in comparison to smartphones. We conducted an exploratory driving simulator study to compare a smartwatch and a smartphone in terms of time to engagement with the device and drivers’ glance patterns. The results show that participants (n=6) chose to engage with the smartwatch faster than with the smartphone, but took longer to read notifications. The smartwatch also led to a larger number of glances greater than 2 seconds than the smartphone. Further investigation of the effects on driving performance is required.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Ajzen

(1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50(2), 179–211.

Brookhuis

Vries

G. de

Waard

D. de

. (1991). The effects of mobile telephoning on driving performance. Accident Analysis & Prevention, 23(4), 309–316.

Burge

Chaparro

(2012). The effects of texting and driving on hazard perception. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting, 56(1), 715–719.

Burnett

Summerskill

Porter

(2004). On-the-move destination entry for vehicle navigation systems: Unsafe by any means? Behaviour & Information Technology, 23(4), 265–272.

Drews

F. a.

Yazdani

Godfrey

C. N.

Cooper

J. M.

Strayer

D. L.

(2009). Text messaging during simulated driving. Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 51(5), 762–770.

Feng

Marulanda

Donmez

(n.d.). Susceptibility to driver distraction questionnaire (SDDQ): Development and relation to relevant self-reported measures. Transportation Research Record.

Klauer

S. G.

Guo

Simons-Morton

B. G.

Ouimet

M. C.

Lee

S. E.

Dingus

T. a.

(2014). Distracted driving and risk of road crashes among novice and experienced drivers. The New England Journal of Medicine, 370(1), 54–9.

Liang

Horrey

W. J.

Hoffman

J. D.

(2012). Reading while driving: A study on drivers’ strategies of in-vehicle task initiation. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting, 56(1), 2186–2190.

Mann

(1997). Introduction : On the bandwagon or beyond wearable computing?, Personal Technologies, 1(4), 203–207.

10.

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. (2010). Visual-manual NHTSA driver distraction guidelines for in-vehicle electronic devices. Washington, DC: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

11.

Olsen

E. O.

Shults

R. a

Eaton

D. K.

(2013). Texting while driving and other risky motor vehicle behaviors among US high school students. Pediatrics, 131(6), e1708–15.

12.

Regan

M. A.

Lee

J. D.

Young

K. L.

(2008). Driver distraction: theory, effects, and mitigation (p. 672). CRC Press.

13.

Tractinsky

Ram

E. S.

Shinar

(2013). To call or not to call–that is the question (while driving). Accident; Analysis and Prevention, 56, 59–70.

14.

Tsimhoni

Smith

Green

(2003). On-the-road assessment of driving workload and risk to support the development of an information manager. Ann Arbor, MI.

15.

Van Der Laan

J. D.

Heino

De Waard

(1997). A simple procedure for the assessment of acceptance of advanced transport telematics. Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies, 5(1), 1–10.