TRANSFER OF TRAINING IN AN ADVANCED DRIVING SIMULATOR: COMPARISON BETWEEN REAL WORLD ENVIRONMENT AND SIMULATION IN A MANOEUVRING DRIVING TASK

Abstract

Driving instructors and novice drivers often remain sceptical about the realistic learning potential driving simulators offer to real world driving tasks. The aim of this experiment was to compare the effectiveness of training in the real system with an advanced driving simulator. The participants were required to learn a specific driving manoeuvre: reverse park a truck with an attached trailer from one side of the street to the other. 50 experienced truck drivers were recruited to participate in the experiment. Initially all participants performed the manoeuvre 3 times in the real system (i.e. in the truck). If a participant completed the task successfully they were credited with a score of ‘1’, if a participant was unable to complete the task successfully he was credited with a score of ‘0’. The time taken to complete the task was also recorded. The participants were then divided into two groups. The two groups proceeded to train the task in one of the two training environments: Group A practised 5 times in the advanced driving simulator, whilst group B practised 5 times in the real system. Once training had been completed, all participants were asked to perform the manoeuvre an additional 3 times in the real system. Successful completion of the task was scored and the time taken to complete the task was once again recorded. The difference in scores between the initial 3 performances and the final 3 performances in the real system were measured allowing a direct comparison between the effectiveness of training in the two learning environments to be made. Whilst the t-test analysis of