Drivers' Steering Behavior When Meeting Another Car: The Case of Perceptual Tropism Revisited

Abstract

It was reported in a recent paper that, when meeting another car, drivers start turning the steering wheel left 2 s before the meeting, indicating, according to the authors explanation, approaching behavior due to the perceptual significance of the oncoming car. The current study was conducted to test an alternative correction-maneuver explanation. The lateral position of passing cars was recorded at several measurement points on two-lane roads, and the mean value was plotted as a function of the time from the meeting instant. The previous data on the steering-wheel angle and the current position data were compared, first on narrow and wide roads and second in car-following and open-road driving condition. Each case involving a more pronounced steering-wheel shift to the left was found to be accompanied by a more pronounced, or sharper, lateral displacement to the right, supporting the correction-maneuver explanation.

The effect of approaching vehicles on the lateral position of cars travelling on a two-lane rural road

“…This overall "reorientation" path strategy was first proposed by Triggs (1980). This hypothesis was later supported by Summala, Leino, and Viermaa (1981). Data reported in these two studies refuted the claim by Helander (1978), based on patterns of steering wheel movements, that drivers tend to steer their cars towards approaching vehicles during the last 2 s before meeting.…”

Modelling level 1 situation awareness in driving: A cognitive architecture approach

“…HPRT could further be broken into brake-perception response time (BPRT) or steering-perception response time (SPRT) when capturing individual brake or steering response latencies. Most studies have focused on evaluating BPRT [124], whereas a few studies have also reported SPRT [125,126,127] There has been extensive research that has investigated the effect of different factors that influence drivers HPRT [124,128,129]. Factors commonly investigated include: age and experience of drivers [122,130], peculiarity of hazards [131,132], effects of distraction [133,134,135], and scenarios involving transfer of control from automated driving [136].…”