Multisensory interface design for drivers: past, present and future

摘要

One of the key concerns raised by Bartlett in his 1962 article 'The future of ergonomics' relates to the difficulties that humans may have in monitoring multiple streams of sensory information (input) simultaneously (or near-simultaneously). Ivan Brown who, like Bartlett before him, was based in Cambridge conducted some of the earliest empirical studies to look at the potential effects of using a radiophone (as mobile phones were called in those days) on driving (see Brown 1965, Brown and Poulton 1961, Brown et al. 1969). Brown's research suggested that while monitoring a stream of auditory information had relatively little effect on the more automatised aspects of driving (such as steering), it did have a markedly detrimental (or interfering) effect on drivers' perception and decision making abilities, such as when deciding whether or not they could steer their car through a narrow gap on a test track.