Drivers’ User-interface Information Prioritization in Manual and Autonomous Vehicles

This study investigated what information items should be presented to drivers in future autonomous vehicles by comparing how preferences regarding information differ from those in the current manual-driving environment. A survey of 29 in-vehicle information items was conducted among 156 participants, who drove a virtual indoor simulator in both manual- and autonomous-driving modes. In all, 29 items of in-vehicle information were classified into three tasks. The primary driving task had mobility as its core value, secondary driving tasks were activities that played supportive roles in vehicular movements (e.g., car accident notifications, wipers), and tertiary driving tasks included non-driving activities. The results indicated that drivers place less priority on receiving secondary task-related information and greater priority on tertiary driving task information in the autonomous mode of driving compared to the manual driving environment. Second, females have a higher preference for information in both modes of driving, whereas males demonstrated a higher incremental level for information in the autonomous environment. Third, older drivers and those in their 20s should be given the highest priority in information dissemination. This study is useful as it can provide a basic guideline for designers of user experiences and user interfaces.