Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Validity of primary driving tasks in head-mounted display-based driving simulators

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Virtual Reality Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The development of new car interior concepts requires tools, particularly in development phases before concept milestones, which enable subjective experiences and evaluations in static and driving situations. On the one hand, variant comparisons are necessary; on the other hand, the level of immersion should be high enough that participants can behave as they would in real cars. Virtual reality technologies and especially head-mounted displays are generally very suitable for such evaluations with the exception being in state-of-the-art driving simulators. Therefore, a validation study was undertaken in which primary driving tasks in two HMD-based simulators were compared with test runs in a real car. The difference between the simulators was only the state of the motion base (enabled vs. disabled). In both simulators and the test runs in the real car, four identical scenarios (straight, curves, overtaking and junction) were carried out. Since the focus is primarily on subjective ratings and gaze behaviour when evaluating new car interior concepts, in this study gaze behaviour was also priority. In addition, driving dynamics parameters were measured. The results reveal that the participants show more valid behaviour in the dynamic system than in the static simulator condition.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11
Fig. 12
Fig. 13
Fig. 14

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Aykent B, Yang Z, Merienne F, Kemeny A (2014) Simulation Sickness comparison between a limited field of view virtual reality head mounted display (Oculus) and a medium range field of view static ecological driving simulator (Eco2). In: Proceedings of the driving Simulation Conference 2014, Driving Simulation Association, Paris, France, 2014, pp 31.1–31.7

  • Aykent B, Merienne F, Kemeny A (2015) Effect of VR device—HMD and Screen Display—on the Sickness for Driving Simulation. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2015, DSA, Tübingen, Germany

  • Berton F, Olivier A-H, Bruneau J, Hoyet L,Pettre J (2019) Studying gaze behaviour during collision avoidance with a virtual walker: influence of the virtual reality setup. In: Proceedings of the conference on virtual reality and 3D user interfaces 2019, IEEE, Osaka, Japan, 2019, pp 717–725

  • Blaauw G-J (1982) Driving Experience and Task Demands in Simulator and Instrumented Car: a Validation Study. Hum Factors 24(4):473–486

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blana E (1996) Driving simulator validation studies: A literature review. ITS Working Paper 480

  • Blissing B, Bruzelius F (2018) Exploring the suitability of virtual reality for driving simulation. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2018 VR, DSA, Antibes, France, 2018, pp 163–166

  • Brument H, Podkosova I, Kaufmann H, Olivier A-H, Argelaguet F (2019) Virtual vs. physical navigation in vr: study of gaze and body segments temporal reorientation behaviour. In: Proceedings of the conference on virtual reality and 3D user interfaces 2019, IEEE, Osaka, Japan, 2019, pp 680–689

  • Burns P-C, Saluäär D (1999) Intersections between driving in reality and virtual reality (VR). In: Proceedings of the DSC 1999, pp 155–164

  • Cao S, Nandakumar K, Babu R, Thompson B (2019) Game play in virtual reality driving simulation involving head-mounted display and comparison of desktop display. Virtual Reality

  • Colombet F, Kemeny A, George P (2016) Motion sickness comparison between a CAVE and a HMD. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2016 VR, DSA, Paris, 2016, pp 201–206

  • Erler P, Rinderknecht S (2017) A newly developed 3 DOF driving simulator for longitudinal dynamics perception investigation. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2017 VR, DSA, Stuttgart, 2017, pp 2–-34

  • Fischer M, Labusch A, Bellmann T, Seehof C (2015) A task-oriented catalogue of criteria for driving simulator evaluation. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2015 VR, DSA, Tübingen, 2015, pp 139–150

  • Grabe V, Pretto P, Giordano P-R, Bülthoff H-H (2010) Influence of display type on drivers´ performance in a motion-based driving simulator. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2010, DSA, Paris, pp 81–88

  • Hartfiel B, Stark R (2019) Influence of vestibular cues in head-mounted display-based driving simulators. In: Proceedings of the DSC 2019 VR, DSA, Strasburg

  • Hartfiel B, Buchholz C, Fresemann C, Tomaszek-Staude W, Stark R (2018) Use-Case orientierte Gestaltungs-empfehlungen für Fahrsimulatoren zur menschzentrierten Absicherung von Sicherheits- und Komfortfunktionen. In: Proceedings of the 19.VDI-Kongress SIMVEC 2018, Köln, pp 655–670

  • Hartfiel B, Kroys A, Kruithof A, Stark R (2019) Driving Simulator with VR-glasses for evaluation of new interior concepts. In: ATZ worldwide, pp 16–24

  • Hirata T, Yai T, Takaqawa T (2007) Development of the driving simulation system MOVIC-T4 and its validation using field driving data. In: Tsinghua Science and Technology, 2007, pp 141–150

  • ISO15007-1 (2014) Road vehicles—Measurement of driver visual behaviour with respect to transport information and control systems—Part 1: Definitions and parameters

  • Mudd S (1968) Assessment of the fidelity of dynamic flight simulators. Human Factors, pp 351–358

  • Reich D (2017) Gestaltungsaspekte immersiver Fahrsimulationsumgebungen—Einfluss visueller und auditiver Parameter auf die Fahrerverhaltensvalidität. Dissertation Technical University Berlin

  • Reich D, Stark R (2016) Head-mounted displays for HCI validations while driving. Int J Electr Inf Eng 2016:1887–1891

  • Riecke B-E, Schulte-Pelkum J, Bülthoff H-H (2005) Perceiving simulated ego-motions in virtual reality—comparing large screen displays with HMDs

  • Rolfe J-M, Hammerton-Frase A-M, Poulter R-F, Smith E-M-B (1970) Pilot response in flight and simulated flight. In: Ergonomics, pp 761–768

  • Ropelato S, Menozzi M, Magnenat S, Summer R, Zünd F (2017) Adaptive tutoring on a virtual reality driving simulator. In: Proceedings of the AIVRAR, Bangkok

  • Ruspa C, Scheuchenpflug R, Quattrocolo S (2000) Ergonomic assessment in virtual reality driving simulators. In: Proceedings of the conference human factors in the age of virtual reality, Dortmund, 2000, pp 319–328

  • Schill V, Schmiedler H-J, Gottlieb W (1997) Car research using virtual reality at Daimler-Benz. In: Proceedings of the DSC 1997, DSA, Lyon

  • Sullivan B-T, Rothkopf C (2012) The role of uncertainty and reward on eye movements in a virtual driving task. J Vis 1–17

  • Tiemann M (2019) Effects of motion system and driving scenario on simulator sickness and presence experience. In: 5th Symposium driving simulation, Aachen

  • Törnros J (1998) Driving behaviour in a real and a simulated road tunnel—A validation study. Accident Analysis and Prevention 497–503

  • Victor T-W, Harbluk J-L, Engström J-A (2005) Sensitivity of eye-movement measures to in-vehicle task difficulty. In: Transportation research part F 8, pp 167–190

  • Walch M, Frommel J, Rogers K, Schüssel F, Hock P, Dobbelstein D, Weber M (2017) Evaluating VR Driving Simulation from a Player Experience Perspective. In: Proceedings of the CHI´17

  • Weidner F, Hoesch A, Poeschl S, Broll W (2017) Comparing VR and non-VR driving simulations: an experimental user study. In: Proceedings of the IEEE virtual reality conference 2017, pp 281–282

  • Zöller I-M (2015) Analyse des Einflusses ausgewählter Gestaltungsparameter einer Fahrsimulation auf die Fahrerverhaltensvalidität. Dissertation Technical University Darmstadt

  • Zöller I-M, Diederich C, Abendroth B, Bruder R (2013) Fahrsimulatorvalidität—Systematisierung und quantitative Analyse bisheriger Forschungen. In: ZfA, 2013, pp 197-206

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Volkswagen AG, Wolfsburg, Germany

    Bert Hartfiel

  2. Technical University Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Bert Hartfiel & Rainer Stark

Authors
  1. Bert Hartfiel
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Rainer Stark
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Bert Hartfiel.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

All the authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

The whole study design was approved by the ethical and data protection board of the Volkswagen AG and also in constant coordination with the Technical University of Berlin as independent organisation. Before each session in the driving simulators or the real car, participants signed declaration of consent and got a security safety briefing.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Hartfiel, B., Stark, R. Validity of primary driving tasks in head-mounted display-based driving simulators. Virtual Reality 25, 819–833 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10055-020-00496-w

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10055-020-00496-w

Keywords

Search

Navigation