Look Who's Talking Now: Implications of AV's Explanations on Driver's Trust, AV Preference, Anxiety and Mental Workload
This research addresses the problem of AV adoption for drivers and society, but it is incremental as it builds on existing work on automation explanations.
The study investigated how explanations from automated vehicles (AVs) affect driver trust, preference, anxiety, and mental workload, finding that explanations given before AV actions increased trust and preference without affecting anxiety or workload.
Explanations given by automation are often used to promote automation adoption. However, it remains unclear whether explanations promote acceptance of automated vehicles (AVs). In this study, we conducted a within-subject experiment in a driving simulator with 32 participants, using four different conditions. The four conditions included: (1) no explanation, (2) explanation given before or (3) after the AV acted and (4) the option for the driver to approve or disapprove the AV's action after hearing the explanation. We examined four AV outcomes: trust, preference for AV, anxiety and mental workload. Results suggest that explanations provided before an AV acted were associated with higher trust in and preference for the AV, but there was no difference in anxiety and workload. These results have important implications for the adoption of AVs.