Driver response and recovery following automation initiated disengagement in real-world hands-free driving.

Advanced driver assistance systems are increasingly available in consumer vehicles, making the study of drivers' behavioral adaptation and the impact of automation beneficial for driving safety. Concerns over driver's being out-of-the-loop, coupled with known limitations of automation, has led research to focus on time-critical, system-initiated disengagements. This study used real-world data to assess drivers' response to, and recovery from, automation-initiated disengagements by quantifying changes in visual attention, vehicle control, and time to steady-state behaviors. Fourteen drivers drove for one month each a Cadillac CT6 equipped with Super Cruise (SC), a partial automation system that, when engaged, enables hands-free driving. The vehicles were instrumented with data acquisition systems recording driving kinematics, automation use, GPS, and video. The dataset included 265 SC-initiated disengagements identified across 5,514 miles driven with SC. Linear quantile mixed-effects models of glance behavior indicated that following SC-initiated disengagement, the proportions of glances to the Road decreased (Q50 Automation-initiated disengagements triggered substantial changes in driver glance behavior including shorter on-road glances and frequent transitions between Road and Instrument Cluster glance locations. This information seeking behavior may capture drivers' search for information related to the disengagement or the automation state and is likely shaped by the automation design. The study findings can inform the design of more effective driver-centric information displays for smoother transitions and faster recovery.