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  • Autonomous Vehicle Visual Embodiment for Pedestrian Interactions in Crossing Scenarios: Virtual Drivers in AVs for Pedestrian Crossing
Title: Autonomous Vehicle Visual Embodiment for Pedestrian Interactions in Crossing Scenarios: Virtual Drivers in AVs for Pedestrian Crossing
This work presents a novel prototype autonomous vehicle (AV) human-machine interface (HMI) in virtual reality (VR) that utilizes a human-like visual embodiment in the driver’s seat of an AV to communicate AV intent to pedestrians in a crosswalk scenario. There is currently a gap in understanding the use of virtual humans in AV HMIs for pedestrian crossing despite the demonstrated efcacy of human-like interfaces in improving human-machine relationships. We conduct a 3x2 within-subjects experiment in VR using our prototype to assess the efects of a virtual human visual embodiment AV HMI on pedestrian crossing behavior and experience. In the experiment participants walk across a virtual crosswalk in front of an AV. How long they took to decide to cross and how long it took for them to reach the other side were collected, in addition to their subjective preferences and feelings of safety. Of 26 participants, 25 preferred the condition with the most anthropomorphic features. An intermediate condition where a human-like virtual driver was present but did not exhibit any behaviors was least preferred and also had a signifcant efect on time to decide. This work contributes the frst empirical work on using human-like visual embodiments for AV HMIs.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1800961
NSF-PAR ID:
10275677
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Extended Abstracts of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
Page Range / eLocation ID:
1 to 7
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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