Ride comfort control system considering driver's psychological state: fundamental consideration on estimating method using biological measurement

Abstract

In recent years, due to environmental problems and aging society, demand for ultra-compact vehicle is increasing. An advantage of ultra-compact vehicle is that they can be used on narrow or rough roads. However, such roads have many steps and irregularities on the ground, and it is expected that ride quality will deteriorate. The authors have proposed mounting a small active seat suspension on the seat as a way to improve ride comfort. The method of evaluation for the psychological state is required to improve ride comfort. In this study, we investigated quantitative and objective method for evaluation of ride comfort. First, ride comfort of participants was evaluated using visual analog scale of subjective evaluation and biological information in exposing experiments. In exposing experiments, an experimental participant was oscillated by 5 Hz sine wave for 3 minutes. Biological information which is heart rate variability was used evaluate the experiments. Second, we selected the biological information for estimating the riding comfort from the correlation between the biological information and the psychological state. Finally, multiple regression analysis was performed using biological information to establish a prediction formula.