Designing an Adaptive Interface: Using Eye Tracking to Classify How Information Usage Changes Over Time in Partially Automated Vehicles

While partially automated vehicles can provide a range of benefits, they also bring about new Human Machine Interface (HMI) challenges around ensuring the driver remains alert and is able to take control of the vehicle when required. While humans are poor monitors of automated processes, specifically during ‘steady state’ operation, presenting the appropriate information to the driver can help. But to date, interfaces of partially automated vehicles have shown evidence of causing cognitive overload. Adaptive HMIs that automatically change the information presented (for example, based on workload, time or physiologically), have been previously proposed as a solution, but little is known about how information should adapt during steady-state driving. This study aimed to classify information usage based on driver experience to inform the design of a future adaptive HMI in partially automated vehicles. The unique feature of this study over existing literature is that each participant attended for five consecutive days; enabling a first look at how information usage changes with increasing familiarity and providing a methodological contribution to future HMI user trial study design. Seventeen participants experienced a steady-state automated driving simulation for twenty-six minutes per day in a driving simulator, replicating a regularly driven route, such as a work commute. Nine information icons, representative of future partially automated vehicle HMIs, were displayed on a tablet and eye tracking was used to record the information that the participants fixated on. The results found that information usage did change with increased exposure, with significant differences in what information participants looked at between the first and last trial days. With increasing experience, participants tended to view information as confirming technical competence rather than the future state of the vehicle. On this basis, interface design recommendations are made, particularly around the design of adaptive interfaces for future partially automated vehicles

Automated design analysis, assembly planning and motion study analysis using immersive virtual reality

Previous research work at Heriot-Watt University using immersive virtual reality (VR) for cable harness design showed that VR provided substantial productivity gains over traditional computer-aided design (CAD) systems. This follow-on work was aimed at understanding the degree to which aspects of this technology were contributed to these benefits and to determine if engineering design and planning processes could be analysed in detail by nonintrusively monitoring and logging engineering tasks. This involved using a CAD-equivalent VR system for cable harness routing design, harness assembly and installation planning that can be functionally evaluated using a set of creative design-tasks to measure the system and users' performance. A novel design task categorisation scheme was created and formalised which broke down the cable harness design process and associated activities. The system was also used to demonstrate the automatic generation of usable bulkhead connector, cable harness assembly and cable harness installation plans from non-intrusive user logging. Finally, the data generated from the user-logging allowed the automated activity categorisation of the user actions, automated generation of process flow diagrams and chronocyclegraphs

The Development and Failure of Social Norms in Second Life

This Note analyzes the development and efficacy of social norms in maximizing the welfare of participants in the virtual community of Second Life. Although some of these norms developed appropriately in response to the objectives and purposes of this virtual world, Second Life is so thoroughly steeped in conditions that have impeded the development of successful social norms in other communities that any system of social norms in Second Life will ultimately fail. Because social norms will likely,fail to successfully maximize resident welfare, regulatory schemes imposed both by the operators of the virtual world and by real-world governing institutions are needed to enhance the functioning of this particular alternative reality inhabited by millions

The Development and Failure of Social Norms in Second Life

This Note analyzes the development and efficacy of social norms in maximizing the welfare of participants in the virtual community of Second Life. Although some of these norms developed appropriately in response to the objectives and purposes of this virtual world, Second Life is so thoroughly steeped in conditions that have impeded the development of successful social norms in other communities that any system of social norms in Second Life will ultimately fail. Because social norms will likely,fail to successfully maximize resident welfare, regulatory schemes imposed both by the operators of the virtual world and by real-world governing institutions are needed to enhance the functioning of this particular alternative reality inhabited by millions

Interactive Camera Network Design using a Virtual Reality Interface

Traditional literature on camera network design focuses on constructing automated algorithms. These require problem specific input from experts in order to produce their output. The nature of the required input is highly unintuitive leading to an unpractical workflow for human operators. In this work we focus on developing a virtual reality user interface allowing human operators to manually design camera networks in an intuitive manner. From real world practical examples we conclude that the camera networks designed using this interface are highly competitive with, or superior to those generated by automated algorithms, but the associated workflow is much more intuitive and simple. The competitiveness of the human-generated camera networks is remarkable because the structure of the optimization problem is a well known combinatorial NP-hard problem. These results indicate that human operators can be used in challenging geometrical combinatorial optimization problems given an intuitive visualization of the problem.Comment: 11 pages, 8 figure

Evaluation of IVR data collection UIs for untrained rural users

Due to the rapid spread of mobile phones and coverage in the developing world, mobile phones are being increasingly used as a technology platform for developing-world applications including data collection. In order to reach the vast majority of mobile phone users without access to specialized software, applications must make use of interactive voice response (IVR) UIs. However, it is unclear whether rural users in the developing world can use such UIs without prior training or IVR experience; and if so, what UI design choices improve usability for these target populations. This paper presents the results of a real-world deployment of an IVR application for collecting feedback from teachers in rural Uganda. Automated IVR data collection calls were delivered to over 150 teachers over a period of several months. Modifications were made to the IVR interface throughout the study period in response to user interviews and recorded transcripts of survey calls. Significant differences in task success rate were observed for different interface designs (from 0% to over 75% success). Notably, most participants were not able to use a touchtone or touchtone-voice hybrid interface without prior training. A set of design recommendations is proposed based on the performance of several tested interface designs

Assigned responsibility for remote robot operation

The remote control of robots, known as teleoperation, is a non-trivial task, requiring the operator to make decisions based on the information relayed by the robot about its own status as well as its surroundings. This places the operator under significant cognitive load. A solution to this involves sharing this load between the human operator and automated operators. This paper builds on the idea of adjustable autonomy, proposing Assigned Responsibility, a way of clearly delimiting control responsibility over one or more robots between human and automated operators. An architecture for implementing Assigned Responsibility is presented

Disrupting Complex Systems with Emerging Technologies: A Study on United States Airport Operations

The number of United States domestic commercial flight passengers are growing every year, which means the number of people checking-in, dropping off their bags, and going through TSA within airports is equally growing. With the increasing number of passengers and aging airports, there are several areas of pain points within airports where passengers hit a bottleneck due to the current systems that airports have in place. There are three main areas that we are going to reference. First the check-in process, where customers have to get their tickets, input identification information, and check-in for their flight. Second, baggage-drop off, where customers get their baggage weighed and tagged. Lastly, is Transport Security Administration (TSA). This is where consumers get their carry-on bags scanned as well as their person. In each of these areas, there are some levels of inconvenience imposed on the customer by the current system. With technological advancements being used in other industries, the goal of this thesis is to look at what existing technologies can be modified and used within airport operations to reduce the long lines that customers face every time they travel