ALARM EFFECTIVENESS IN DRIVER-CENTERED COLLISION-WARNING SYSTEMS

The potential use of systems that seek to communicate a warning of imp ending collision directly to the driver is examined. Technological adv ances in collision-warning systems include reliable, low-cost radars, sensors with low noise levels, and the development of accurate detecti on algorithms for particular crash types, e.g. rear-end collisions. Ho wever, fundamental practical constraints make perfect sensor detection difficult to achieve. Imperfect detection conflates the false alarm r ate and experience with other technologies confirms driver aversion to false warnings. Although sensitive alarm systems with high detection rates and low false alarm rates have been developed, the posterior pro bability of a collision given an alarm can be quite low because of the low base rate of collision events. As a result, only a small proporti on of alarms will represent true collision scenarios. These and other factors can conspire to reduce alarm effectiveness in collision-warnin g systems. The problem is illustrated analytically and potential solut ions are advanced.