Do you have distracted drivers as clients? You may want to put them behind the wheel of this attention-powered car being tested Down Under – a car that would give Knight Rider a run for his money.
Road safety researchers from the Royal Automobile Club of Western Australia have created an “attention-powered car” – a vehicle that slows to a crawl when drivers get distracted.
“We are highlighting the impact of how quickly we can lose concentration, causing lives to be lost, and leaving families and friends to deal with the consequences of road trauma,” says Pat Walker, the RAC’s executive general manager. “Over the past 20 years Western Australia has gone from best in class to worst in class. Since 2006 we have consistently been above the national fatality rate and alarmingly more than half of fatalities in WA happen on our country roads.”
In the experiment, researchers fitted volunteers with a 14-point headset to monitor brain activity. When the equipment showed the person was being inattentive, software would override the car's accelerator, slowing its speed. When the subject regained his focus, the car – a Hyundai i40 – would start moving normally again.
It is a feat that is reminiscent of the 1980s television show Knight Rider, and his automated car KITT.
To see the vehicle in operation, click here. (continued.)
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In testing, the researchers gave drivers common tasks like checking their phone, or reading a map, and asked them to drive at various speeds. By studying neuro imagery for several parts of the brain, they could see if a person was concentrating or "zoning out" (more common at slow speeds). As well as EEG headsets, they also used equipment to measure indicators like blink rate and head movement, building up an in-depth picture of attentiveness on the road.
The Attention Powered Car features an Emotiv EEG neuro headset that connects brain activity to the car’s engine via customised software. The software communicates with the car and when the driver’s level of attention drops the car safely slows down, alerting the driver to their lapse in concentration.
The impact of distracted driving has been compared to drunk driving, and for Walker – who cites numbers from his home state in Australia – better education of drivers to the dangers of distracted driving could definitely save lives.
“The impact of inattention is now comparable to the number of deaths and serious injuries caused by speed and drink driving which are all contributors to Western Australia consistently having the worst fatality rate of any Australian state,” he says. “Nationally, it is estimated inattention was a factor in 46 per cent of fatal crashes. (continued.)
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“If Western Australia’s fatality rate came down to the national rate, more than 45 lives would be saved each year.”
The headset has 14 sensors detecting electrical activity from the frontal, temple, parietal and perceptual areas of the brain. The amount of activity in these areas registers what the driver is cognitively processing, or if they are zoning out. It can also tell if the driver is task switching, which means they’re paying attention, just not to driving. A gyroscope, GPS and an accelerometer are also included to improve accuracy and to measure a whole range of variables including head movement.
The technology has been installed into a Hyundai i40 which will only run at full capacity when the driver is paying attention.
