ABSTRACT
The Chapter. Driving simulators have come down radically in cost and ease of operation, some requiring nothing more than a stand-alone tablet or head-mounted display. Correspondingly, their use has expanded greatly, in terms of research, testing, and training. Researchers wanting to study teen and novice drivers using simulators and practitioners wanting to apply them can sometimes feel overwhelmed in deciding which simulator to purchase for a particular function. We hope to make this decision easier by giving readers interested in teen and novice driver behaviors, and those largely unfamiliar with driving simulators as a way of studying such behaviors, a sense of the following: the range of driving simulators now available; some of the most critical issues to consider when deciding what type of driving simulator to purchase; the different dependent variables that can be measured, including both vehicle and driver behaviors; the problems created by simulator sickness and how to mitigate these problems; and a range of special considerations. Limitations and Recommendations. (1) We do not cover here the important question of just how well training drivers on a simulator transfers to the real world. Those issues are covered in Chapter 21. (2) The scope of this chapter does not afford ample opportunity to delve deeply into some of the issues that are raised. As such, we aim to cover those topics in just enough depth to give the reader some appreciation for the range of design issues and other
25.1 Introduction ......................................................................................396 25.2 Types of Simulators ..........................................................................397
