Browsing by Author "Patrick, Rafael"
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- Construction inspection & monitoring with quadruped robots in future human-robot teaming: A preliminary studyHalder, Srijeet; Afsari, Kereshmeh; Chiou, Erin; Patrick, Rafael; Hamed, Kaveh Akbari (Elsevier, 2023-04-15)Construction inspection and monitoring are key activities in construction projects. Automation of inspection tasks can address existing limitations and inefficiencies of the manual process to enable systematic and consistent construction inspection. However, there is a lack of an in-depth understanding of the process of construction inspection and monitoring and the tasks and sequences involved to provide the basis for task delegation in a human-technology partnership. The purpose of this research is to study the conventional process of inspection and monitoring of construction work currently implemented in construction projects and to develop an alternative process using a quadruped robot as an inspector assistant to overcome the limitations of the conventional process. This paper explores the use of quadruped robots for construction inspection and monitoring with an emphasis on a human-robot teaming approach. Technical development and testing of the robotic technology are not in the scope of this study. The results indicate how inspector assistant quadruped robots can enable a human-technology partnership in future construction inspection and monitoring tasks. The research was conducted through on-site experiments and observations of inspectors during construction inspection and monitoring followed by a semi-structured interview to develop a process map of the conventional construction inspection and monitoring process. The study also includes on-site robot training and experiments with the inspectors to develop an alternative process map to depict future construction inspection and monitoring work with the use of an inspector assistant quadruped robot. Both the conventional and alternative process maps were validated through interview surveys with industry experts against four criteria including, completeness, accuracy, generalizability, and comprehensibility. The findings suggest that the developed process maps reflect existing and future construction inspection and monitoring work.
- Designing Explainable In-vehicle Agents for Conditionally Automated Driving: A Holistic Examination with Mixed Method ApproachesWang, Manhua (Virginia Tech, 2024-08-16)Automated vehicles (AVs) are promising applications of artificial intelligence (AI). While human drivers benefit from AVs, including long-distance support and collision prevention, we do not always understand how AV systems function and make decisions. Consequently, drivers might develop inaccurate mental models and form unrealistic expectations of these systems, leading to unwanted incidents. Although efforts have been made to support drivers' understanding of AVs through in-vehicle visual and auditory interfaces and warnings, these may not be sufficient or effective in addressing user confusion and overtrust in in-vehicle technologies, sometimes even creating negative experiences. To address this challenge, this dissertation conducts a series of studies to explore the possibility of using the in-vehicle intelligent agent (IVIA) in the form of the speech user interface to support drivers, aiming to enhance safety, performance, and satisfaction in conditionally automated vehicles. First, two expert workshops were conducted to identify design considerations for general IVIAs in the driving context. Next, to better understand the effectiveness of different IVIA designs in conditionally automated driving, a driving simulator study (n=24) was conducted to evaluate four types of IVIA designs varying by embodiment conditions and speech styles. The findings indicated that conversational agents were preferred and yielded better driving performance, while robot agents caused greater visual distraction. Then, contextual inquiries with 10 drivers owning vehicles with advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) were conducted to identify user needs and the learning process when interacting with in-vehicle technologies, focusing on interface feedback and warnings. Subsequently, through expert interviews with seven experts from AI, social science, and human-computer interaction domains, design considerations were synthesized for improving the explainability of AVs and preventing associated risks. With information gathered from the first four studies, three types of adaptive IVIAs were developed based on human-automation function allocation and investigated in terms of their effectiveness on drivers' response time, driving performance, and subjective evaluations through a driving simulator study (n=39). The findings indicated that although drivers preferred more information provided to them, their response time to road hazards might be degraded when receiving more information, indicating the importance of the balance between safety and satisfaction. Taken together, this dissertation indicates the potential of adopting IVIAs to enhance the explainability of future AVs. It also provides key design guidelines for developing IVIAs and constructing explanations critical for safer and more satisfying AVs.
- Development and Evaluation of an Assistive In-Vehicle System for Responding to Anxiety in Smart VehiclesNadri, Chihab (Virginia Tech, 2023-10-18)The integration of automated vehicle technology into our transportation infrastructure is ongoing, yet the precise timeline for the introduction of fully automated vehicles remains ambiguous. This technological transition necessitates the creation of in-vehicle displays tailored to emergent user needs and concerns. Notably, driving-induced anxiety, already a concern, is projected to assume greater significance in this context, although it remains inadequately researched. This dissertation sought to delve into the phenomenon of anxiety in driving, assess its implications in future transportation modalities, elucidate design considerations for distinct demographics like the youth and elderly, and design and evaluate an affective in-vehicle system to alleviate anxiety in automated driving through four studies. The first study involved two workshops with automotive experts, who underscored anxiety as pivotal to sustaining trust and system acceptance. The second study was a qualitative focus group analysis incorporating both young and older drivers, aiming to distill anxiety-inducing scenarios in automated driving and pinpoint potential intervention strategies and feedback modalities. This was followed by two driving simulator evaluations. The third study was observational, seeking to discern correlations among personality attributes, anxiety, and trust in automated driving systems. The fourth study employed cognitive reappraisal for anxiety reduction in automated driving. Analysis indicated the efficacy of the empathic interface leveraging cognitive reappraisal as an effective anxiety amelioration tool. Particularly in the self-efficacy reappraisal context, this influence influenced trust, user experience, and anxiety markers. Cumulatively, this dissertation provides key design guidelines for anxiety mitigation in automated driving, and highlights design elements pivotal to augmenting user experiences in scenarios where drivers relinquish vehicular control.
- Development of Shared Situation Awareness Guidelines and Metrics as Developmental and Analytical Tools for Augmented and Virtual Reality User Interface Design in Human-Machine TeamsVan Dam, Jared Martindale Mccolskey (Virginia Tech, 2023-08-21)As the frontiers and futures of work evolve, humans and machines will begin to share a more cooperative working space where collaboration occurs freely amongst the constituent members. To this end, it is then necessary to determine how information should flow amongst team members to allow for the efficient sharing and accurate interpretation of information between humans and machines. Shared situation awareness (SSA), the degree to which individuals can access and interpret information from sources other than themselves, is a useful framework from which to build design guidelines for the aforementioned information exchange. In this work, we present initial Augmented/virtual reality (AR/VR) design principles for shared situation awareness that can help designers both (1) design efficacious interfaces based on these fundamental principles, and (2) evaluate the effectiveness of candidate interface designs based on measurement tools we created via a scoping literature review. This work achieves these goals with focused studies that 1) show the importance of SSA in augmented reality-supported tasks, 2) describe design guidelines and measurement tools necessary to support SSA, and 3) validate the guidelines and measurement tools with a targeted user study that employs an SSA-derived AR interface to confirm the guidelines distilled from the literature review.
- The Effect of Novel External Communication Display on Pedestrian Judgements of AccelerationRadlbeck, Joshua (Virginia Tech, 2024-06-07)Pedestrian fatalities are on the rise in the United States, and this trend shows no signs of reversing. One contributing factor to these incidents is pedestrians' difficulty in accurately assessing traffic conditions and vehicle actions, leading to potentially fatal collisions. One promising solution could be the use of additional visual cues through external vehicle lighting on the front of vehicles to aid pedestrians in making safer decisions. This research explored this possibility through two studies that examined an LED display mounted on the grill of a study vehicle. The display changed color to communicate whether the vehicle was accelerating or decelerating (the display turned white if the vehicle was accelerating, and amber if the vehicle was decelerating). The first study assessed how well participants could judge whether the vehicle was accelerating or decelerating when the display was active versus inactive, and whether a verbal explanation of the display's function improved their understanding. The second study not only revisited judgement accuracy, but also examined its influence on participants' crossing intentions. Additionally, this study evaluated if repeated exposure to the display in a different traffic scenario (maneuvering a left turn at a stop sign controlled intersection) enhanced understanding as well as verbal explanations, which are less feasible in real world traffic situations. Findings from these studies indicated that a clear verbal explanation of the display significantly enhanced participants' ability to discern vehicle acceleration and deceleration, but exposure to the display in other traffic scenarios provided the same benefit. Study 2 did not observe significant changes in the safety buffer (i.e. the amount of time between when participants decide to cross, and when there would be a conflict with the vehicle if they did cross), but the average number of safe crossing decisions versus unsafe was improved, though these results were inconsistent across participants. These findings suggest potential for enhancing pedestrian safety by providing pedestrians with additional information through external vehicle lighting displays. Future research should focus on optimal implementations strategies for such displays and investigate any possible unintended consequences of deploying this technology on public roads.
- Effects of Personal Listening Device on Pedestrians' Acoustic Situation Awareness in a Virtual Reality EnvironmentDam, Abhraneil; Duff, Charlie; Jeon, Myounghoon; Patrick, Rafael (SMARTech Georgia Tech, 2022-06-27)The technological developments for Personal Listening Devices (PLDs) have been staggering in the recent years; our listening experience has improved drastically but it has also affected our ability to remain cognizant of our acoustic environment. The student population remains the largest user group of PLDs. The distraction from PLDs can be dangerous in situations that require focused attention, such as crossing unsignalized crosswalks on college campuses. In this study, the researchers use a virtual reality (VR) based pedestrian simulator to task participants with crossing a replica campus street while listening to music through air and bone conduction PLDs. As a secondary task, participants were tasked with detecting and localizing (i.e., bi-directionally) a clearly audible ambulance siren during the crossing. It is hypothesized that there will be improved detection and localization performance with bone conduction PLDs, and that speech free music will be as distracting as music with speech. This study will also provide insights towards the use of PLDs as V2P communication interfaces during crosswalk situations.
- The Effects of System Transparency and Reliability on Drivers' Perception and Performance Towards Intelligent Agents in Level 3 Automated VehiclesZang, Jing (Virginia Tech, 2023-07-05)In the context of automated vehicles, transparency of in-vehicle intelligent agents (IVIAs) is an important contributor to drivers' perception, situation awareness (SA), and driving performance. However, the effects of agent transparency on driver performance when the agent is unreliable have not been fully examined yet. The experiments in this Thesis focused on different aspects of IVIA's transparency, such as interaction modes and information levels, and explored their impact on drivers considering different system reliability. In Experiment 1, a 2 x 2 mixed factorial design was used in this study, with transparency (Push: proactive vs. Pull: on-demand) as a within-subjects variable and reliability (high vs. low) as a between-subjects variable. In a driving simulator, twenty-seven young drivers drove with two types of in-vehicle agents during Level 3 automated driving. Results suggested that participants generally preferred the Push-type agent, as it conveyed a sense of intelligence and competence. The high-reliability agent was associated with higher situation awareness and less workload, compared to the low-reliability agent. Although Experiment 1 explored the effects of transparency by changing the interaction mode and the accuracy of the information, a theoretical framework was not well outlined regarding how much information should be conveyed and how unreliable information influenced drivers. Thus, Experiment 2 further studied the transparency regrading information level, and the impact of reliability on its effect. A 3 x 2 mixed factorial design was used in this study, with transparency (T1, T2, T3) as a between-subject variable and reliability (high vs. low) as a within-subjects variable. Fifty-three participants were recruited. Results suggested that transparency influenced drivers' takeover time, lane keeping, and jerk. The high-reliability agent was associated with the higher perception of system accuracy and response speed, and longer takeover time than the low-reliability agent. Participants in T2 transparency showed higher cognitive trust, lower workload, and higher situation awareness only when system reliability was high. The results of this study may have significant effects on the ongoing creation and advancement of intelligent agent design in automated vehicles.
- Interaction-Triggered Estimation of AR Object Placement on Indeterminate MeshesLuksas, John Peter (Virginia Tech, 2024-10-30)Current Augmented Reality devices rely heavily on real-time environment mapping to provide convincing world-relative experiences through user interaction with virtual content integrated into the real world. This mapping is obtained and updated through many different algorithms, but often results in holes and other mesh artifacts when generated in less ideal scenarios, like outdoors and with fast movement. In this work, we present the Interaction-Triggered Estimation of AR Object Placement on Indeterminate Meshes, a quick, interaction-triggered method to estimate the normal and position of missing mesh pieces in real-time with low computational overhead. We achieve this by extending the user's hand using a group of additional raycast sample points, aggregating results according to different algorithms, and then using the resulting values to place an object. This thesis will first cover problems with current mapping techniques, thoroughly explain the rationale and algorithms behind our method, and then evaluate our method using a user study.
- Moral injury and psychosocial functioning in healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemicWeber, Marcela C.; Smith, Andrew J.; Jones, Russell T.; Holmes, Glen A.; Johnson, Alicia L.; Patrick, Rafael; Alexander, M. David; Miyazaki, Yasuo; Wright, Hannah; Ehman, Anandi C.; Langenecker, Scott; Benight, Charles C.; Pyne, Jeffrey M.; Harris, J. Irene; Usset, Timothy J.; Maguen, Shira; Griffin, Brandon J. (American Psychological Association, 2023-02)Studies of moral injury among nonmilitary samples are scarce despite repeated calls to examine the prevalence and outcomes of moral injury among civilian frontline workers. The purpose of this study was to describe the prevalence of moral injury and to examine its association with psychosocial functioning among health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. We surveyed health care workers (N = 480), assessing exposure to potentially morally injurious events (PMIEs) and psychosocial functioning. Data were analyzed using latent class analysis (LCA) to explore patterns of PMIE exposure (i.e., classes) and corresponding psychosocial functioning. The minimal exposure class, who denied PMIE exposure, accounted for 22% of health care workers. The moral injury-other class included those who had witnessed PMIEs for which others were responsible and felt betrayed (26%). The moral injury-self class comprised those who felt they transgressed their own values in addition to witnessing others’ transgressions and feeling betrayed (11%). The betrayal-only class included those who felt betrayed by government and community members but otherwise denied PMIE exposure (41%). Those assigned to the moral injury-self class were the most impaired on a psychosocial functioning composite, followed by those assigned to the moral injury-other and betrayal-only classes, and finally the minimal exposure class. Moral injury is prevalent and impairing for health care workers, which establishes a need for interventions with health care workers in organized care settings.
- Novel In-Vehicle Gesture Interactions: Design and Evaluation of Auditory Displays and Menu Generation InterfacesTabbarah, Moustafa (Virginia Tech, 2023-01-30)Driver distraction is a major contributor to car crashes, and visual distraction caused by using invehicle infotainment systems (IVIS) degrades driving performance and increases crash risk. Air gesture interfaces were developed to mitigate for driver distraction, and using auditory displays showed a decrease in off-road glances and an improved perceived workload. However, the design of auditory displays was not fully investigated. This thesis presents directional research in the design of auditory displays for air-gesture IVIS through two dual-task experiments of driving a simulator and air-gesture menu navigation. Experiment 1 with 32 participants employed a 2x4 mixed-model design, and explored the effect of four auditory display conditions (auditory icon, earcon, spearcon, and no-sound) and two menu-generation interfaces (fixed and adaptive) on driving performance, eye glance behavior, secondary task performance and subjective perception. Each auditory display (within-subjects) was tested with both a fixed and adaptive menu-generation interface (between-subjects). Results from Experiment 1 demonstrated that spearcon provided the least visual distraction, least workload, best system usability and was favored by participants; and that fixed menu generation outperformed adaptive menu generation in driving safety and secondary task performance. Experiment 2 with 24 participants utilized the best interface to emerge from Experiment 1 to further explore the auditory display with the most potential: spearcon. 70% spearcon and 40% spearcon were compared to text-to-speech (TTS) and no audio conditions. Results from Experiment 2 showed that 70% spearcon induced less visual distraction than 40% spearcon, and that 70% spearcon resulted in the most accurate but slowest secondary task selections. Experimental results are discussed in the context of the multiple resource theory and the working memory model, design guidelines are proposed, and future work is discussed.
- Technological and Social Distractions at Unsignalized and Signalized Campus Crosswalks: A Multi-Stage Naturalistic Observation StudyDam, Abhraneil; Oberoi, Pooja; Pierson, Jake; Jeon, Myounghoon; Patrick, Rafael (Elsevier, 2023-08)The student population between 18 to 25 years of age remains the largest user group for earphones or personal listening devices (PLDs). PLDs can be quite distracting, especially when its users are performing focused tasks such as street crossings. On large rural university campuses, students often must cross multiple unsignalized crosswalks to get to their destination. To evaluate the dangers of PLD use and pedestrian behavior while navigating crosswalks, we systematically observed multiple crosswalks of a sprawling rural university campus in south-west Virginia, USA. The study was conducted following a three-stage protocol consisting of 9 hours of on-site video recorded observations, a survey of 135 pedestrians, and finally, 2 focus groups with 8 pedestrians in total. This three-stage approach provides a comprehensive understanding of pedestrian behavior and the university-campus culture. Results from this study show the extent of distracted behaviors, safety measures adopted by pedestrians, and identify future research directions involving safety countermeasures for distracted pedestrians.
- Utilizing Immersive Technologies in the Air Traffic Control DomainBajaj, Shivani; Jorquera, Andrew; Duff, Sammy; Patrick, Rafael (CORE Scholar - Wright University, 2021-05-01)The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) holds a vital role in the United States, employing over 14,000 Air Traffic Control/Management (ATC/ATM) specialists responsible for managing roughly 43,000 flights each day. ATC education “wash-out” rates have shown that there is a disconnect between the training process and the implementation of cognitively demanding, safety-critical ATC duties. The purpose of this research was to investigate if, how, and where immersive technologies (i.e., augmented, virtual, and mixed reality) could be helpful within the ATC/ATM educational domain. To accomplish the overall research goal, subject matter expert (SME) interviews were conducted and a potential educational tool was developed and tested in two distinct research phases. Eighteen (N = 18) subjects volunteered to participate throughout both phases, and the tool was rated to be above average meaning the tool is usable in its current form; however, further development is suggested and expected