Quantitative Analysis of Situation Awareness During Autonomous Vehicle Handover on the Da Vinci Research Kit

The current trends in the research and development of self-driving technology aim for Level 3+ autonomy, where the vehicle controls both lateral and longitudinal motions of the dynamic driving task, while the driver is permitted to divert their attention, as long as they are able to react properly to a handover request initiated by the vehicle. At this level of autonomy, situation awareness of the human driver has become one of the most important metrics of safety. This paper presents the results of a user study to evaluate handover performance at Level 3 autonomy. The study investigates whether the level of situation awareness during critical handover situations has a direct impact on task performance, with higher situation awareness expected to lead to better outcomes during emergency interventions. The study is performed in a simulated environment, using the CARLA driving simulator and the master console of the da Vinci Surgical System. The test subjects were asked to answer the questions of a questionnaire during the experiment; the answers for those questions and the measured control signals were analyzed to gain further knowledge on the safety of the handover process.