Examining Seniors’ Adaptation to Mixed Function Automated Vehicles: Analysis of Naturalistic Driving Data

The study examined whether advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) can benefit the mobility and driving performance of senior drivers. Two groups of driving data, collected separately from two naturalistic driving projects, were examined. The Second Strategic Highway Research Program and the Examining Seniors’ Adaptation to Mixed Function Automated Vehicles project databases were used to compare measurements of mobility and driving performance. Mobility analyses did not yield significant differences between seniors who drove conventional vehicles and those who drove ADAS-equipped vehicles. As to driving performance, three analyses were conducted to address different research interests. Results indicated that ADAS-equipped vehicles influence seniors’ driving performance both in positive as well as negative ways. Seniors generally displayed better speed management performance while driving the ADAS-equipped vehicles. Using adaptive cruise control (ACC) may help seniors reduce the frequency and level of higher g-force accelerations. However, poorer lateral control performance was observed during trips where ACC was used. The study is the first to investigate the influence of ADAS on the mobility and driving performance of seniors in real-world traffic and road environments.