Using survival analysis to investigate factors influencing time to map reactivation in map-assisted pedestrian navigation and reactivation Time Prediction

Mobile maps can provide efficient navigation assistance for pedestrian navigation, primarily through routes displayed on the map or auditory navigation instructions. Research on when pedestrians need navigation assistance helps mobile map navigation systems provide guidance at appropriate times. There has been research on when to give auditory navigation instructions in pedestrian navigation. However, pedestrians sometimes choose to check the route on the map rather than depend on auditory instructions due to their limitations, such as being unavailable in noisy environments. Therefore, studying when pedestrians reactivate mobile map to check the route during navigation and the factors affecting the time of map checking are significant. It can help navigation systems provide proactive and context-aware guidance according to pedestrians’ needs, which can reduce pedestrians’ cognitive load and improve the pedestrian navigation experience. To achieve this goal, this thesis utilized a dataset from a map-assisted pedestrian navigation experiment in a virtual reality environment. Survival Analysis was applied for statistical analysis due to its advantage in analyzing time-to-event data. It focuses on studying how long it takes pedestrians to reactivate the mobile map to check the route after it has been locked, and the factors influencing this time. The results demonstrate that human factors (e.g., age, spatial ability, and map use frequency) and environmental factors (e.g., route length, route section, and shortcuts) significantly impact the time to map reactivation during map-assisted pedestrian navigation. The results also illustrate the time when pedestrians need navigation instructions is predictable according to these factors by applying Survival Analysis.