Recent studies show that while current safety systems in automobiles are living up to their potential, the drivers that use such systems may be less vigilant or more easily distracted.
Two studies were conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) looking into the effectiveness of technology that prevents cars from drifting into another lane, and systems that warn drivers of vehicles in their blind spots.
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The first study, related to the lane-keeping systems, found that between 2009 and 2015 (when the technology was sold as optional for vehicle models of those years) the systems lowered rates of single-vehicle, sideswipe and head-on crashes of all severities by 11%, as well as crashes of those types in which there were injuries, by 21%.
Although there were only 40 fatal crashes in the data, and researchers utilized a simplified analysis that did not account for differences in drivers’ ages, genders, insurance risk and other potential crash factors, it was found that lane-keeping technology reduced fatal crash rates by 86%.
“Now we have evidence that this technology really can save lives and has the potential to prevent thousands of deaths once it’s on every vehicle,” IIHS vice-president for research Jessica Cicchino told
The Associated Press.
The second study, this time on blind-spot detection systems, found that the systems lowered the rate of all lane-change crashes by 14%, as well as the rate of such crashes with injuries, by 23%.
While the results of these studies are promising, other studies show that drivers are too reliant on the systems over what they can see with their own eyes.
Another study by the IIHS, together with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s AgeLab, found that drivers using automated systems that help scan for parking spots spend more time looking at their dashboard displays than at the actual parking spot. Drivers with vehicles equipped with blind-spot monitoring technology have also told researchers that they sometimes do not look behind them when changing lanes because they rely on the safety systems for guidance.
“It’s still possible that there are some crashes that are happening that wouldn’t have happened before because people are now behaving in different ways,” Cicchino explained.
“[It is] critical that drivers understand the capabilities and, more importantly, the limitations of the safety technology in their vehicle before getting behind the wheel,” commented Automobile Association of America director of automotive engineering Greg Brannon.
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