Michael Oehl

German Aerospace Center (DLR) | DLR · Institute of Transportation Systems

The article metaphorically transfers the idea of “in-the-loop”, “out-of-the-loop” and “on-the-loop” from direct control of a vehicle to the influence and control of scientists on the in- and out-of-the-loop problem, here of teleoperation of vehicles. The article is based on the findings of an interdisciplinary group of experts coordinated by the Ge...

Remote operation is an approach used to aid the deployment of highly automated vehicles (HAVs, SAE Level 4) on public roads. Although there has been substantial technological and legal progress for a human operator to remotely support HAVs, Human Factors research can further enhance its success by helping to enable safe, efficient, and user-friendl...

Remotely operating highly automated vehicles (HAVs, SAE 4 [1]) bears the potential to boost their large-scale deployment. A human operator supports the vehicle automation remotely in situations that exceed the automation's capabilities. A high-quality video stream displaying the HAV's environment is key for the remote operator to obtain and maintai...

The investigation of automated vehicle acceptance (AVA) has received considerable attention in the past few years. Studies have examined AVA from the perspective of road users inside automated vehicles (AVs), such as drivers and passengers. The AVA by pedestrians is still little understood. Understanding the factors impacting their acceptance is pi...

Remote operation of highly automated vehicles (HAVs) may include occasional assistance from a human remote operator that is located outside the HAVs. Remote assistance typically delegates only high-level guidance tasks to the remote operators such as authorizing a driving maneuver or specifying a new driving path. As remote assistance is fairly une...

This report summarises the work and valuable contributions of a large group of experts and the many constructive discussions over the course of 2022 and 2023.

Highly automated shuttle vehicles (SAE Level 4) have the potential to enhance public transport services by decreasing the demand for drivers, enabling more frequent and flexible ride op- tions. However, at least in a transitionary phase, safety operators that supervise and support the shut- tles with their driving tasks may be required on board the...

Der vorliegende Bericht fasst die Arbeit und die wertvollen Beiträge einer großen Expertengruppe sowie die Vielzahl an konstruktiven Diskussionen im Laufe der Jahre 2022 und 2023 zusammen.

Remotely operating vehicles utilize the benefits of vehicle automation when fully automated driving is not yet possible. A human operator ensures safety and availability from afar and supports the vehicle automation when its capabilities are exceeded. The remote operator, conceptualized as remote assistant, fulfills the legal requirements in German...

Automated vehicles will soon be integrated into our current traffic system. This development will lead to a novel mixed-traffic environment where connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) will have to interact with other road users (ORU). To enable this interaction, external human–machine interfaces (eHMIs) have been shown to have major benefits rega...

Remotely operating vehicles utilizes the benefits of vehicle automation when fully automated driving is not yet possible. A human operator ensures safety and availability from afar and supports the vehicle automation when its capabilities are exceeded. The remote operator thus fulfills the legal requirements in Germany as a Technical Supervisor to...

The successful integration of highly automated vehicles (HAV) in future mixed traffic environments will depend, among other things, on their seamless, safe, and accepted interaction with other road users. Therefore, appropriate combination of light signals, as external human-machine interface (eHMI), and driving behavior, as dynamic human-machine i...

This study proposed a new methodological approach for the assessment of road user automated vehicle acceptance (AVA) pre-and post-automated vehicle (AV) experience. Users can be inside and outside AVs. Inside users can include drivers, safety drivers, and passengers of AVs. Outside users are external road users interacting with AVs, such as pedestr...

Als Wegbereiter für die Mobilität der Zukunft verspricht die Remote Operation von automatisierten Fahrzeugen (SAE 4) einen Ansatz, der die Vorteile des automatisierten Fahrens effektiv nutzt, solange vollautomatisierte Fahrzeuge (SAE 5) noch nicht Realität sind. Sicherheit und Zuverlässigkeit werden durch einen Remote Operator als Technische Aufsic...

Remotely operating vehicles utilizes the benefits of vehicle automation when fully automated driving is not yet possible. A high level of safety and availability is ensured from afar by a human operator who supports the vehicle automation when its capabilities are exceeded. The remote operator thus fulfils the legal requirements in Germany as a Tec...

In an older version of this paper, there was error in figure 2. This has been corrected

This research deals with the design of external human-machine interfaces (eHMI) for two differently sized highly automated vehicle types (passenger car vs. bus) focusing on the interaction between highly automated vehicles (HAVs) and pedestrians of different age groups. Research has shown that at least in some situations HAVs need to be able to com...

In virtual stop (vStop) pick-up scenarios the shared automated vehicle’s (SAV) approaching behavior as implicit communication to the awaiting customer is an important factor to build trust in the vehicle. Identifying the SAV timely could also help users getting ready for boarding and foster a positive perception of the automated service. An online...

Highly automated vehicles (HAVs) are becoming more and more advanced and will be soon part of our traffic system. Although the drivers will no longer be in charge of the driving task, they remain an important part of the human-vehicle system and need to understand the HAV’s current and future behavior to feel safe and trust the vehicle automation....

Highly automated vehicles (HAVs) may enhance safety, eco-friendliness, and inclusivity in the mobility sector. Across Germany, a plethora of real-world laboratories with HAVs providing novel mobility solutions in real-world settings has been implemented recently. Due to technological and legal restraints, a steward is required on board of the HAV i...

Shared automated mobility on-demand (SAMOD) is considered as a promising mobility solution in the future. Users book trips on-demand via a smartphone, and service algorithms set up virtual stops (vStop) where users then need to walk to board the automated shuttle. Navigation and identification of the virtual pickup location, which has no references...

Background: Remote operation is a promising approach to bridge the gap between today’s technological shortcomings and the efficient use of highly automated vehicles (HAVs) at Level 4 (SAE, 2021). This technology enables HAVs to be remotely operated if necessary, e.g., from a Remote Operation Center (ROC) through Remote Driving or Remote Assistance....

Background: Highly automated vehicles (HAVs) at Level 4 (SAE, 2021) bear the potential to make mobility safer, eco-friendlier, and more inclusive. Across Germany, a plethora of real-world laboratories with HAVs providing novel mobility solutions in real-world settings has been implemented recently. Due to technological and legal restraints, a stewa...

There is no paper or PPT available. Panel discussion.

This paper gives an overview of the results of the German national project AutoAkzept. The objective of the project was to develop solutions for the design of automated vehicles that promote the development of trust and thus acceptance for connected, cooperative, and automated mobility by reducing or even preventing subjective uncertainties and ass...

Background: With the development of progressively automated vehicles (AV), i.e., high and full automation, the role of a nowadays car driver executing the driving task or at least monitoring the automation and simultaneously the driving environment is turning into the future role of a mere user of the automated system. This raises the question of t...

Background: Automated driving functionalities with the goal of fully automated driving are in the research scope of all big OEMs. Automated vehicles (AV) should perform the complete driving task safely by detecting relevant objects and perceiving the driving environment. Due to the shift of control, the role of the driver changes to an on-board use...

Future automated vehicles (AVs) of different sizes will share the same space with other road users, e. g., pedestrians. For a safe interaction, successful communication needs to be ensured, in particular, with vulnerable road users, such as pedestrians. Two possible communication means exist for AVs: vehicle kinematics for implicit communication an...

Differently sized automated vehicles (AVs) will enter the roads of tomorrow and will interact with other road users. Pedestrians as vulnerable road users heavily rely on the communication with other road users, especially for the interaction with larger vehicles, as miscommunication pose a high risk. Therefore, AVs need to provide communication abi...

Automated driving is a disruptive technology related to a plethora of safety-related, economical, and ecological improvements. However, even cutting-edge driving automation technology at SAE Level 4 is not capable of coping with all scenarios that can possibly occur in naturalistic road traffic. A remote operator may be a viable approach to observe...

Highly automated vehicles (HAVs) are becoming more and more advanced and will be soon part of our traffic system. Although the drivers will no longer be in charge of the driving task, they remain an important part of the human-vehicle system and need to understand the HAV’s current and future behavior to feel safe and trust the vehicle automation....

Empathic vehicles are expected to improve user experience in automated vehicles and to help increase user acceptance of technology. However, little is known about potential real-world implementations and designs using empathic interfaces in vehicles with higher levels of automation. Given advances in affect detection and emotion mitigation, we cond...

Remote operation bears the potential to roll out highly automated vehicles (AVs, SAE Level 4) more safely and quickly. Moreover, legal regulations on highly automated driving, e.g., the current law on highly automated driving (SAE Level 4) in Germany, permit a remote supervisor to monitor and intervene in driving operations remotely in lieu of a sa...

Pedestrians as vulnerable road users highly depend on the communication with other road users. This also applies to their future interaction with automated vehicles (AVs), especially with larger sized AVs, as miscommunication can have serious consequences. Current research manifested that pedestrians need implicit communication, e.g., vehicle dynam...

This study deals with the interplay of an external HMI to transmit explicit communication signals via 360° LED light-band and a dynamic HMI to transmit implicit communication signals via vehicle dynamics. Previous results on the interplay of dHMI and eHMI indicated that pedestrians tended to rely on the explicit communication via eHMI to indicate t...

Um eine objektiv sichere und subjektiv akzeptierte Einführung hochautomatisierter Fahrzeuge (SAE 4) in den Straßenverkehr zu gewährleisten, ist eine ganzheitliche Gestaltung der Mensch-Maschine-Interaktion dieser Fahrzeuge und ihrer dazu notwendigen Schnittstellen mit dem Menschen (MMS bzw. HMI) von großer Bedeutung. Dabei sind besonders zweierlei...

Hochautomatisierte Fahrzeuge (AV) und ihre Integration in einen zukünftigen Mischverkehr stehen immer mehr im Fokus von Automobilherstellern und Forschung. Da die Anwesenheit menschlicher Fahrer im AV nicht mehr Voraussetzung ist, wird eine sichere und unmissverständliche Interaktion des AV mit der Umwelt essentiell sein. Externale Mensch-Maschine-...

Shared automated mobility on-demand (SAMOD) is considered as a conven-ient mobility solution in the future. Once the user books a fare via smartphone, the DRT service algorithms set up a pick-up location spontaneously. The user then walks to the flexible meeting point and waits for the shuttle. Here, the users’ main challenge is to navigate and to...

This research deals with the design of external Human-Machine Interfaces (eHMI) for two different vehicle types (car vs. bus) focusing on the interaction between highly automated vehicles (AV) and pedestrians of different age groups. AV need to be able to communicate with their surrounding traffic environment and their messages should be universall...

Der Mischverkehr mit Fahrzeugen unterschiedlicher Automatisierungsgrade wird das Straßenverkehrsgeschehen der kommenden Jahre prägen. Eine wichtige Voraussetzung für die Verkehrssicherheit wird dabei die sichere, eindeutige und erwartungskonforme Interaktion der Verkehrsteilnehmenden mit hoch- und vollautomatisiert betriebenen Fahrzeugen sein – im...

Um Vertrauen in den automatisierten Fahrdienst aufzubauen und ein effizientes Halteszenario an flexiblen, virtuellen Haltestellen zu ermöglichen, ist das Bremsverhalten des automatisierten Shuttles von großer Bedeutung.

Der Einsatz virtueller Haltestellen (vStop) erfordert neue nutzerzentrierte Informations- und Interaktionskonzepte, um die Nutzerakzeptanz nachfrageorientierter, vernetzter und automatisierter Mobilitätsdienste zu maximieren.

Für den On-Demand-Service hochautomatisierter Shuttles (AVF) wird es flexiblere virtuelle Ein- bzw. Ausstiegsmöglichkeiten für Passagiere geben. Sowohl das geplante Halten an diesen virtuellen Haltestellen, als auch ein Halten aufgrund technischer Probleme müssen dem rückwärtigen Verkehr kommuniziert werden.

Automatisierte und vernetzte Fahrzeuge (AVF) müssen im Mischverkehr der Zukunft in der Lage sein, mit anderen Verkehrsteilnehmenden zu kommunizieren. Besonders in mehrdeutigen Verkehrssituationen und gemischten Verkehrsräumen mit vulnerablen Verkehrsteilnehmenden bringt ein eHMI Vorteile.

This paper gives an overview of the results of the German national project AutoAkzept. The objective of the project was to develop solutions for the design of automated vehicles that promote the development of trust and thus acceptance for connected, cooperative, and automated mobility by reducing or even preventing subjective uncertainties and ass...

Background: Passengers are more likely to experience kinetosis also known as “motion sickness” in automated vehicles than in manually driven ones. Therefore, the reduction or avoidance of motion sickness will become an increasingly important psychological issue to be dealt with. In several studies the provision of motion cues via light-based in-car...

Background: experiencing frustration on the road might affect relevant cognitive processes, can result in aggressive behavior, and hence may negatively influence driving performance and so traffic safety. Frustration is triggered when goal-directed behavior is blocked, which frequently occurs during driving, e.g., due to construction sites, dense t...

Background: Frustration is an emotion that can turn into anger and (road) rage. These negative emotions and the aggressive driving behaviors associated with them are in turn relevant causes of accidents and road fatalities. To address this, the project F-RELACS (Frustration Real-Time Recognition for an Adaptive In-Car System) funded by the German g...

Although general car safety has increased considerably and at the same time accident numbers have decreased remarkably on average in the European Union during the last years, the percentage of novice and young car drivers involved in heavy car accidents is still remaining dramatically high, e.g., in Germany more than twice as high compared to older...

This research deals with the design of external human-machine interfaces (eHMI) for two differently sized highly automated vehicle types (passenger car vs. bus) focusing on the interaction between highly automated vehicles (HAVs) and pedestrians of different age groups. Research has shown that at least in some situations HAVs need to be able to com...

In virtual stop (vStop) pick-up scenarios the shared automated vehicle’s (SAV) approaching behavior as implicit communication to the awaiting customer is an important factor to build trust in the vehicle. Identifying the SAV timely could also help users getting ready for boarding and foster a positive perception of the automated service. An online...

Human factors issues are manifold in the development of automated driving. In the talk, the presenters provided an overview of current DLR research projects addressing the perspectives of users, control center operators, and surrounding road users in individual and public transportation with autonomous vehicles. Examplarily, a number of projects we...

In order to increase acceptance of automated mobility on-demand (AMoD) it is essential to provide high usability along the whole user journey. The user’s challenges of getting to flexible pick-up locations and the identification of the booked shuttle need to be addressed from a user-centered perspective. A workshop was conducted with HCI experts to...

Background. Future automated vehicles (AVs) of different sizes will share the same space with other traffic participants (TPs), e.g., manually-driven vehicles, cyclists or pedestrians. For a safe interaction, communication needs to be ensured, in particular, with vulnerable road users, e.g., pedestrians. This study focuses on two important research...

Teleoperation of vehicles has the potential to serve as an approach to reap off the benefits of automated driving already in the near future when fully automated vehicles (SAE level 5 [1]) will not yet be fully operable. In teleoperated driving, a human op-erator in a remote control center boosts passenger safety and service reliability by monitori...

Teleoperated driving as an enabler has the potential to bridge the gap to fully automated driving (SAE Level 5 [13]) by monitoring and controlling remotely highly automated vehicles (AVs, SAE 4) whenever their automation fails to do so. To ensure safe and efficient teleoperation, a user-centered human-machine interface (HMI) considering use cases,...

To ensure safety in future mixed traffic, automated vehicles (AV) will have to interact in an understandable way with other, more vulnerable road users (VRU). Current research has shown positive effects on the AV-VRU interaction for external human-machine interfaces (eHMI). The paper presents preliminary results of an online video study, focusing o...

The focus of this study is the future interaction between pedestrians and automated buses. Pedestrians highly depend on the communication with other road users as misunderstandings can have serious consequences. This applies especially for the interaction with a larger sized automated vehicles (AVs), e.g., an automated bus. Current research has sho...

In the near future, automated vehicles (AV) will be introduced into mixed traffic environments and therefore will interact with different traffic participants. To guarantee a safe interaction, the AV needs to communicate future intentions and behavior especially for the interaction with vulnerable road users, e.g., pedestrians. As possible communic...

In 1994, Deffenbacher et al. published the Driving Anger Scale (DAS), a tool for assessing a driver’s propensity to experience anger in road traffic. Since then, much research has used this scale to measure the driving anger experienced in various countries around the world. This study examines the scale’s validity for German drivers. It also relat...

Despite the well-known distracting effects, many drivers still engage in phone use, especially texting and especially among young drivers, with new emerging messaging modes. The present study aims to examine the effects of different answering modes on driving performance. Twenty-four students (12 females), aged between 19 and 25 years (M = 20.83, S...

The development of automated vehicles (AVs) and their integration into traffic are seen by many vehicle manufacturers and stakeholders such as cities or transportation companies as a revolution in mobility. In future urban traffic, it is more likely that AVs will operate not in separated traffic spaces but in so-called mixed traffic environments wh...

The absence of a human driver in an automated vehicle (AV) raises new challenges in communication and cooperation between road users, especially for ambiguous situations where road users would like to communicate their intention explicitly. This paper investigates the effect of a novel external human-machine interface (eHMI) which was designed to a...

An important factor for the acceptance and thus the spread of automated and connected driving (ACD) is the degree of subjective uncertainty that users experience when interacting with automated vehicles. Subjective uncertainties always occur when people are not able to predict the further course of a situation or future events due to lack of experi...

The absence of a human driver in an automated vehicle (AV) raises new challenges in communication and cooperation between road users, especially for ambiguous situations where road users would like to communicate their intention explicitly. This paper investigates the effect of a novel external human-machine interface (eHMI) which was designed to a...

Frustration negatively affects user experience both in manual and automated driving and negatively influences driving performance and system acceptance. Hence, frustration-aware in-vehicle systems that assess the drivers’ current level of frustration and help to mitigate it have gained attention. However, while there has been ample of research on t...

Frustration while driving possibly causes accidents. Therefore, frustration-aware in-vehicle systems that help to mitigate frustration have gained increasing attention. Until now, little is known about effective interaction strategies. Recent studies indicate that voice interfaces enable natural human-machine interaction and thus could be valuable...

Future traffic will be determined by the joint interaction of automated vehicles and other traffic participants in mixed traffic environments. For an overall safe and efficient traffic flow, the communication between automated vehicles and pedestrians must be ensured. An external human-machine interface (eHMI) serves as a communication channel betw...

Paving the way to future mobility, teleoperation of vehicles promises a reachable solution to effectively use the benefits of automated driving as long as fully automated vehicles (SAE 5) are not entirely feasible. Safety and reliability are assured by a human operator who remotely observes the vehicle and takes over control in cases of disturbance...

Motion sickness (MS) is a syndrome associated with symptoms like nausea, dizziness, and other forms of physical discomfort. Automated vehicles (AVs) are potent at inducing MS because users are not adapted to this novel form of transportation, are provided with less information about the own vehicle’s trajectory, and are likely to engage in non-driv...

This presentation focuses on the process of developing and evaluating a human-machine interface for the teleoperation of automated vehicles (SAE 4) as on-demand shuttle buses integrated in an urban network of public transport.

Future traffic will be determined by the joint interaction of highly automated vehicles (AV) and other traffic participants, e.g., pedestrians, in mixed traffic environments. To ensure a safe and efficient traffic flow, AVs must be able to communicate with the traffic environment. An external human-machine interface (eHMI) seems to be a promising s...

Situationen im Straßenverkehr können aufgrund ihrer hohen Komplexität und dynamischen Entwicklung rasch unübersichtlich werden, vor allem, wenn man sich nicht konzentriert. Das DLR untersucht, wie sich diese Herausforderung durch den Mischverkehr mit neuen Fahrzeugtypen, Mobilitätsangeboten und zunehmender Vernetzung und Automatisierung absehbar we...

The automation of driving tasks is proceeding rapidly. However, for quite some time, highly and especially fully automated driving (SAE 4 and 5) may not be completely feasible from a technical perspective. In order to compensate for the shortcomings of technological progress, teleoperation may serve as a way to effectively use the benefits of autom...

Until fully automated driving (SAE level 5) will be achieved, there is still a long way to go. However, interim technologies may speed up the market introduction of highly automated vehicles (AVs). Teleoperation has the potential to enable a safe transition towards fully automated vehicle operation, especially for complex scenarios the automation c...

Frustration while driving possibly causes accidents. Therefore, frustration-aware in-vehicle systems that help to mitigate frustration have gained in-creasing attention. Until now, little is known about effective interaction strategies. Recent studies indicate that voice interfaces enable natural hu-man-machine interaction and thus could be valuabl...

Frustration negatively affects user experience both in manual and automated driving and negatively influences driving performance and system ac-ceptance. Hence, frustration-aware in-vehicle systems that assess the drivers’ current level of frustration and help to mitigate it have gained attention. However, while there has been ample of research on...

In order to increase acceptance of automated mobility on-demand (AMoD) it is essential to provide high usability along the whole user journey. The user’s challenges of getting to flexible pick-up locations and the identification of the booked shuttle need to be addressed from a user-centered perspective. A workshop was conducted with HCI experts to...