Evaluation of the usability of certain symbols indicating automobile lighting status
Abstract
The research presented in this document addresses the ability of drivers to understand what information has been presented by symbols that are used to indicate certain status of vehicle lights. The concept known as usability can be applied extensively to ergonomic design and testing of a wide range of products and systems, including cars. In order to assess drivers' understanding of what information is exactly presented by symbols that are used to describe the state of the lighting system of an automobile, a usability test was designed. The test included 4 symbols, three of which were ISO-approved symbols. This study of usability of symbols on a sample of drivers showed that understanding of information represented by symbols is relatively low, ranging from 41.93% to 61.29%. Certain statistical tests allow for prognosis results on a population level, using the data based on a sample. For that purpose, we used the Z-test of a sample proportion. Testing of statistical hypotheses yielded even lower values of symbols understanding at the population level, for each tested symbol. Suggestions have been made to improve the usability of this type of symbol.
Downloads
Copyright (c) 2022 Journal of Road and Traffic Engineering
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY-NC that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).
