Research On Novice Driver’s Lane-changing Behavior And Cognitive Process Based On The Information Processing Model

With the rapid development of social economy,the road network continues to spread,and the number of private cars is rising,which leads to more and more traffic jams and accidents.Lane change,as a typical traffic scene,is also a high-frequency scene of traffic accidents.Drivers needs to switch fixations before lane change to extract more environment information and ensure the driving safety.But the driver’s ability is often limited,especially the novice drivers are prone to make mistakes in the face of complex and diverse information.Therefore,based on the driver information processing model and the driver’s personal driving style,this paper studies the characteristics of novice drivers’ perception,cognition and operation when they are faced with dynamic driving environment.The research results are helpful to better understand the cognitive mechanism and behavior mode of novice drivers when lane changing,and provide suggestions for the design of lane change assistance system.In this study,the lane change scene was composed by three vehicles,the leading vehicle in the current lane,the leading vehicle in the target lane,the rear vehicle in the target lane,which was built up by the driving simulator.29 novice drivers participated in the experiment.The eye track data was collected by the ere tracker,the cognition data was collected by the questionnaires and the driving data was collected by the driving simulator.All of the data was analyzed by statistical methods.The results showed that the eye movement characteristics of drivers changed significantly after the acceleration of the leading vehicle in the target lane: the fixation time decreased,the saccade angle,saccade speed and the frequency of observing the rearview mirror increased.However,50% of the driving samples didn’t have the cognition of acceleration,which indicated that there was a gap between the perception and cognition of the driver.The gap might be influenced by the driver’s own driving style.Besides,the cognition of speed change was related to the sustained attention,the longer the fixation time and the more focused the saccade range,the more correct the cognition of the speed change of the leading vehicle in the current lane was.Driver’s driving behavior characteristics were mainly affected by driving style and cognitive features.The subjects showed four lane change strategies facing the same lane change scene.Risky drivers were more likely to change lanes and change lanes riskier,while careful drivers were less likely to change lanes.The subjects who had a correct cognition of the speed change of the leading vehicle in the current lane were more likely to change lanes.The correct cognition of the speed change of the leading vehicle in the current lane can help the subjects to make appropriate lane change strategies.The subjects had higher cognitive accuracy on the deceleration of the leading vehicle in the current lane,therefore,the subjects changed lane more in the condition of the leading vehicle in the current lane decelerating.All the subjects slowed down first and then accelerated when lane changing.Moreover,the steering wheel angle,lateral displacement and lateral velocity when the leading vehicle in the current lane decelerated were larger than the corresponding parameters of lane changing when the leading vehicle in the current lane accelerated.This study analyzed the visual,cognition and lane changing characteristics of novice drivers in response to the change of vehicle speed around them,and discussed the influence of cognitive process and driving style on lane change behavior.It found that there was a gap between the perception and cognition of novice drivers.On the one hand,this difference can be used to reflect the driver’s personal characteristics.On the other hand,it provided suggestions for designing more personal and more safety lane change assistance system.