General Motors Will Present Important Safety Research at Utah Driver Assessment Symposium

Annual meeting sponsored by GM draws experts from around the world

Warren, Mich. - How many activities can a motorist safely tackle while behind the wheel? Does an increase in your heart rate mean you're doing too much? General Motors will release the results of two studies on driver and vehicle safety at the second International Driving Symposium on Human Factors in Driver Assessment, Training and Vehicle Design in Park City, Utah.

GM is the lead sponsor of this year's symposium, which begins Monday. The symposium attracts some of the world's foremost authorities on driver distraction and other driver cognition issues and behaviors. Some 130 experts from 12 countries are expected to exchange scientific research during the four-day symposium.

"As the world's largest vehicle manufacturer, GM is committed to improving vehicle safety and driver performance," said Bill Kemp, a GM vehicle safety executive. "We hope this symposium will help spark new ideas and understanding surrounding the issues of driver distraction and driver performance."

In the first study, GM researchers will present work that focuses on a method to analyze driver performance data and identify, to what extent, secondary, in-vehicle behaviors like talking on a cell phone or changing a CD, are distracting. In the second study, researchers examined the use of physiological reactions like heart rate and eye activity to assess how much distraction a driver is managing.

Authors of the first study, Richard A. Young, Ph.D., a GM staff research scientist and Linda Angell, a GM senior staff research scientist, observed 81 drivers in an on-road test to examine the effect that manual tasks, not related to the primary task of driving, have on driver performance. and the factors that contribute to it. Results of the research showed that using only one variable to measure driver performance cannot capture all of the performance variations seen when a person is performing secondary tasks. Their work could ultimately aid in the analysis of testing data for in-vehicle technologies and lead to enhanced design standards.

The second study, completed by John Lenneman, GM research scientist, and Richard W. Backs, Ph.D., associate professor of experimental psychology at Central Michigan University, examined 20 test subjects as they drove on a simulated road through a series of curves. As subjects drove, researchers measured various reactions of the heart. Based on their results, Lenneman and Backs confirmed that measuring physiological reactions, such as muscle tension, can be a useful supplemental tool to measure driver workload.

GM wants to provide customers with the in-vehicle technologies that they want in a way that allows them to keep their attention focused on the driving task. To help ensure this, GM conducts studies in a variety of settings including real-world, simulated and laboratory environments.

GM also launched a program in conjunction with the Michigan Secretary of State in 2001 that helps educate drivers about how to avoid distractions while driving. For more information about this program, please visit www.gmability.com

GM is the only automaker that has announced a set of common-sense principles to guide the design of in-vehicle technologies. The principles require that GM's communication and infotainment systems sold in the USA and Canada be designed to:

Maximize eyes-on-road and hands-on-wheel time. Minimize the number of steps required to complete a task. Create a common interface in all GM vehicles Lock out systems that create unnecessary and excessive attention demands on the driver while he or she is driving. GM's involvement in the symposium is part of its ongoing SenseAble driving initiative - a $10-million program incorporating research, education and technology to address distracted driving.