INVESTIGATION OF DRIVING PERFORMANCE, VECTION, POSTURAL SWAY, AND SIMULATOR SICKNESS IN A FIXED-BASED DRIVING SIMULATOR

This paper reports the results of a pilot study conducted to determine whether there is a relationship between simulator sickness and measur es of driver inputs, vection, and postural sway, in a fixed base drivi ng simulator. Seven males and four females performed a series of alter nating left and right turns (20 each), with straight-aways inbetween. The task was designed to promote experiences of circular and linear ve ction, and associated sway. It was hypothesized that greater driver in puts (i.e., steering wheel and braking activity, deviation from the ce nterline) would correlate with reports of vection and measures of post ural sway. Ten of the eleven subjects reported moderate sickness, whic h precluded any statistical comparisons between ''sick'' and ''not sic k'' however, thee was a significant tendency for persons who reported vection to also report sickness. There were no gender differences in r eported incidence of vection or sickness, however, males tended to exh ibit greater lateral velocity. The next phase of investigation will ne cessitate reducing the strength of the stimulus (i.e., require less tu rns) to increase variability of sickness scores amongst subjects and p ermit comparisons between ''sick'' and ''hot side'' Measurement consid erations include increasing the sensitivity of vection ratings, and ex amination of the timecourse for the development of postural sway. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.