Investigating the abilities of people with dementia to take over driving control in conditionally automated vehicles

What is the study about?

This study is interested in learning how people with dementia and/or Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) handle self-driving cars. By understanding what people may find useful or hard about self-driving cars, researchers can make improvements to this technology.

 

Who can participate?

This study is open to the participation of individuals who meet the following criteria: People living with mild dementia, Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), or Subjective Cognitive Complaints (SCC), as well as older individuals in good health, are invited to participate (as control groups). Participants should currently hold a valid driver’s license or have voluntarily ceased driving sometime in the past 18 months.

 

Time requirement

• You will be asked to complete a screening over the phone and then come to Toronto Rehab for two in-person visits.
• The first visit will take about 2 hours. It will involve answering questionnaires and doing memory and visual tasks. You will also be asked to drive in a driving simulator for approximately 10 minutes. A driving simulator is a type of test vehicle that looks, operates, and feels like a real car, but it has very limited motion (it can only turn on the spot) and allows you to drive through computer-generated scenes.
• The second visit will take about 2.5 hours. It will involve driving in the driving simulator for about 40 minutes with breaks every 10 minutes.
• You will also be asked if you are interested in taking part in an interview, which will take place over video call after the in-person sessions.

Study investigator

Dr. Alex Mihailidis, Dr. Gary Naglie

More information

N/A

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