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MIT study says Tesla drivers become ‘inattentive’ when Autopilot is on

A recent study conducted by researchers at MIT shows that the self-driving Autopilot feature in Tesla vehicles may be causing drivers to become more inattentive when behind the wheel.

With Tesla set to launch a beta update for its self-driving system in the coming weeks, lawmakers and regulators may be hesitant for the electric car manufacturer to roll out the autonomous driving technology.

This as the study points to Autopilot being more of a driver assist feature than a fully fledged autonomous driving interface.

For the study, researchers specifically looked at driver glance data, specifically looking at visual behaviour patterns before and after Autopilot disengagement.

“Before disengagement, drivers looked less on road and focused more on non-driving related areas compared to after the transition to manual driving. The higher proportion of off-road glances before disengagement to manual driving were not compensated by longer glances ahead,” researchers found.

While the fact that drivers chose to ignore the road while Autopilot is on comes as no real surprise, what is interesting is where they were looking when not trained on the road.

On this front, researchers say drivers looked directly downwards much of the time and did not look at the central console, which leads them to believe that whatever they were focusing on, “were presumably non-driving related”.

Whether the findings of this study could be used by Tesla and other autonomous vehicle manufacturers to refine their software, remains to be seen, but it is clear that as many safety measures need to be in place if self-driving technology is to be widely implemented.

We have already seen Tesla propose the use on in-car cameras to monitor drivers while using Autopilot and the company’s recent history involving crashes were Autopilot may have played a role, will continue to prompt probes into the technology.

To read the MIT study in full, head here.

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