Using Virtual Reality to Help Teenagers with Autism Learn to Drive
Vanderbilt University engineers have developed a special adaptive virtual reality driving environment for individuals with autism spectrum disorder, or ASD. There are a number of off-the-shelf driving simulators available, but none have the capabilities built into the Vanderbilt VR Adaptive Driving Intervention Architecture (VADIA). Not only is it specifically designed to teach adolescents with ASD the basic rules of the road, but VADIA also gathers information about the unique ways that they react to driving situations. This will allow the system to alter driving scenarios with varying degrees of difficulty to provide users with the training they need while keeping them engaged in the process. Ultimately, it may also help screen individuals whose deficits are too severe to drive safely. The research setup consists of an automotive-style bucket seat, steering wheel, brake and gas pedals in front of a large, flat screen display on a height-adjustable table. The black box sitting directly below the screen is an eye-tracker that keeps track of where the driver is looking. Participants don a headset containing electrodes that read the electrical activity of their brain (EEG) and they are hooked up to an array of physiological sensors that record the electrical activity of the driver's muscles (EMG), electrical activity of the heart (ECG), galvanic skin response, blood pressure, skin temperature and respiration. The elaborate monitoring allows the researchers to determine if the driver is engaged or bored by the simulation.
Transcript
00:00:06 he's 16 years old a junior in high school we have another driving session Brandon Roberson will test drive a car without leaving this lab let's adjust the chair so that it's comfortable for you I have very high functioning Asperger's with the combination of a severe ADHD that makes it so I can't focus on nearly anything I'm pretty hyperactive sometimes before he starts
00:00:32 driving brandon is set up for research if you could just put your right foot on that gas pedal Brandon's car is this virtual reality driving simulator developed by Vanderbilt engineers it has many driving scenes covering all the rules of the road in all types of weather and while driving sensors are checking for changes in heart rate breathing and brain waves
00:01:05 we also need to measure their emotional states that whether they're feeling anxious they are feeling really frustrated or really enjoying this and driving a camera also continuously monitors Brandon's eyes how often you take your eyes off the road whether you are looking at the pedestrians or oncoming traffic straight ahead armed with that feedback the simulator adapts
00:01:28 to the driver reinforcing proper driving rules it has devices like this that could help fill the gap in teaching life skills to autistic teens there's been such an emphasis appropriate emphasis on early identification and early treatment and just less so as a field line okay well know people are adolescents and adults and and what do we do to help people
00:01:55 bear preliminary study results show this intervention system is helping teens driving skills the studies undergoing but right now what we are seeing that there is a definite difference the next step to see if that can translate to the real world Brandon says the intervention is helping him things that I wouldn't notice in
00:02:20 real life the game picks up that I didn't realize it because of the eye tracker and it notifies me of those things and then I remember oh hey I need to do that in Nashville or Kramer reporting