Virtual reality (VR) has proven to be a useful tool for conducting human factors research in interface design. With the development and promotion of autonomous vehicle (AV) technology, researchers are focusing on designing different types of interfaces to induce trust in road users toward this new technology. In this article, VR is used to investigate pedestrians’ understanding of proposed designs for external features on AVs. We are also interested in investigating how the presence of an operator inside the vehicle influences pedestrians’ preference for features. VR headset tracking, survey-based responses, and video-recorded body movements are used to collect data on pedestrian responses to three operator statuses and seven feature types. Pedestrians prefer both “walk” in text and verbal message saying safe to cross as clear and comforting features on an AV. They perceive the distracted operator condition as to be an inconvenient situation even for the AV equipped with visual or audible features. Older people find the features more helpful and people with higher innovativeness rate the feature ideas with higher ratings.

中文翻译：

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在自动驾驶车辆存在的情况下，通信功能如何帮助行人安全：虚拟现实实验

虚拟现实 (VR) 已被证明是在界面设计中进行人为因素研究的有用工具。随着自动驾驶汽车 (AV) 技术的发展和推广，研究人员正专注于设计不同类型的界面，以引起道路使用者对这项新技术的信任。在本文中，VR 用于调查行人对自动驾驶汽车外部特征的拟议设计的理解。我们也有兴趣调查车内操作员的存在如何影响行人对特征的偏好。VR 头显跟踪、基于调查的响应和视频记录的身体运动用于收集行人对三种操作员状态和七种特征类型的响应数据。行人更喜欢文字和口头信息中的“步行”，如 AV 上清晰和舒适的特征，可以安全通过。即使对于配备有视觉或听觉功能的 AV，他们也认为操作员分心的情况是一种不方便的情况。年龄较大的人认为这些功能更有帮助，而具有较高创新性的人对功能创意的评分也较高。