This paper describes two laboratory-based experiments which evaluate the effect of transient event frequency
content and scale on the human detection of road surface type by means of steering wheel vibration. This study
used steering wheel tangential direction acceleration time histories which had been measured in a mid-sized
European automobile that was driven over two different types of road surface. The steering acceleration stimuli
were manipulated by means of the mildly non-stationary mission synthesis (MNMS) algorithm in order to
produce test stimuli which were selectively modified in terms of the number, and size, of transient vibration
events they contained. Fifteen test participants were exposed to both unmanipulated and manipulated steering
wheel rotational stimuli by means of a steering wheel vibration simulator. For each road surface type a total of
45 vibration test stimuli were presented to each participant. Each participant was asked to state, by means of a
simple "yes" or "no" answer, whether each individual stimuli was from a road surface which was being
presented in front of the simulator as a picture on a large board. Using Signal Detection Theory as the
analytical framework the results were summarized by means of the detectability index d' and by means of
receiver operating curve (ROC) points. Improvements of up to 20 percentage points in the rate of correct
detection were achieved by means of selective manipulation of the steering vibration stimuli. The results
suggested that no single setting of the MNMS algorithm proved optimal for both two road surface types that
were investigated
