New Advanced Driving Assistance Systems Case Study

Introduction
New Advanced Driving Assistance Systems (ADAS) are entering the market at a rapid pace. Some of these systems will support drivers by automating crucial driving tasks such as longitudinal and lateral control of the vehicle. The introduction of those systems in commercial vehicles is directed to increase safety, comfort and efficiency. Good examples of these ADAS are Active Cruise Control (ACC) and Lane Keeping Assist (LKA), which provide longitudinal and lateral control, respectively. While the former has been available for more than two decades, the latter is now being implemented by some car manufacturers. Consequently, the drivers of these vehicles will have the possibility to hand over the steering wheel and pedal controls
ERPs provide valuable information about the electrophysiological activity associated to multiple psychological processes, of which one of the most studied is attention. In particular, ERPs have particularly been useful for analyzing voluntary (‘top-down’) and involuntary (‘bottom-up’) allocation of attentional resources on a task. In operational contexts such as driving, this method has been proven to reliably discriminate when the level of demands or priority of the primary task have changed (Isreal, Kramer..). The principle behind this is that, as the primary task requires more perceptual-central resources, less neural resources are available for the secondary task, thus affecting the latency and/or amplitude of the related components. In this work, ERPs were used to analyze top-down attention allocation to a secondary task to account for fluctuations in drivers’ attentional engagement during automated and manual
N1 has been reported to reflect early stages of attentional processing, in particular, distribution of perceptual resources (Parasuraman 1990, Kramer & Spinks 1991). Higher amplitudes in N1 have been associated to a ‘sensory’ gain as result of early selective processes. In dual task experiments, N1 amplitude has been shown to decrease (less negative), as cognitive load increases, thus, reflecting a higher requirement of perceptual resources (Allison and Polich, 2008, Ullsperger, 2001, Miller, 2011). On the other hand, P3b component has been consistently reported as a reliable index for later stages in the attentional processing related with the semantic processing of the stimuli. Whereas, P3b latency has been associated to the ‘timing’ of the processing, that is, ‘when’ the stimulus is categorized (Kutas, et), P3b amplitude has been more related to the ‘amount’ of attentional resources devoted to a task and the ‘intensity’ of the processing. In dual tasks studies, results indicate that P3b amplitude in response to a secondary task, is particularly sensitive to manipulations on the difficulty or priority of the primary task component (Isreal et al, 1980b, Kramer et al 1983, Kramer et al, 1987, Wickens et al.