Main Aims and Objectives
Increasing the number of people cycling will improve population health, and reduce congestion and pollution. However, cycling in cities can be complex and risky with many different things in the environment that must be attended to. Busy roads and junctions are problematic, especially for novices, as it may not be clear which vehicle/object is a potentially dangerous target and which a harmless distractor that could be safely ignored. Safety is the main factor putting people of using bikes as an everyday form of transport. The aim of this project is to use augmented reality to help people cycle more safely by reducing visual complexity and allowing riders to focus their attention appropriately.
Our own previous research (Al-taie et al., 2022, 2023) investigated cyclist/driver interactions and showed where riders look in different road scenarios. The overarching goal of this project is thus to simplify busy road scenarios for the cyclist so that dangerous targets (say a small grey car) are amplified, whereas harmless distractors (say a loud noise) are reduced (Ahrens et al., 2019). Ultimately the cyclist will experience a simplified version of a cluttered busy road environment, reducing the cognitive load required to successfully navigate the cycling path through it. To do this, we will combine state-of-the-art augmented reality based around detailed perceptual psychology to create an application for everyday cycling.
Proposed Methods
This research is at the intersection of eye-tracking, psychology and human-computer interaction. It will involve both empirical and technical work. In the first year, the student will augment experienced cyclists with eye-tracking glasses while they cycle around the city to understand where they look and how they focus their attention in different road scenarios. We will compare this to a group of novice cyclists so that we can see the differences in attention and find where novices become overloaded and make mistakes. The resulting analyses will identify correct and incorrect ‘gaze’ behaviour toward targets and distractors.
The next stage will be to design and test augmented reality solutions to help novice riders focus their attention appropriately. We will do this using attention and perception research from Psychology to create solutions that we can evaluate in our cycling simulator. We anticipate masking distracting elements of the scene that are not relevant, for example desaturating objects that the experienced cyclists did not attend to, while enhancing those that were most important for the experts. Testing our designs in the simulator means that we can re-create different road scenarios with different complexities to test the effectiveness of our designs in safety. In these scenarios, participants/cyclists should have fewer collisions as irrelevant distractors will be masked.
The final part of the work will be to test the best solutions from the simulator in the real world, under carefully controlled settings. These studies will show whether the solutions work in realistic settings. One potential way to do this will be for participants to stand by road junctions and to experience the perceptual and attentional manipulations while we measure their attention. We may also be able to test riders using our solutions in specific environments. From these studies, we will be able to find the optimal solutions as the final output for the project.
Eligibility
Applicants must have or expect to obtain the equivalent of a 1st or 2:1 degree in any subject relevant to the CDT including, but not limited to, computing science, psychology, linguistics, mathematics, sociology, engineering, physics, etc.
Applicants will be asked to provide two references as part of their application.
Funding
Funding is available to cover the annual tuition fees for UK home applicants, as well as an annual stipend at the standard UKRI rate (currently £17,668 for 2022/23). To be classed as a home applicant, candidates must meet the following criteria:
- Be a UK National (meeting residency requirements), or
- Have settled status, or
- Have pre-settled status (meeting residency requirements), or
- Have indefinite leave to remain or enter.
As per UKRI funding guidelines, up to 30% of studentships may be awarded to international applicants who do not meet the UK home status requirements. Funding for successful international students will match that of home students and no international top-up fees will be payable.
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