VR for Remote Monitoring of Automated Vehicles: Replications Across Follow-Up Evaluations

Although autonomous vehicles have shown remarkable scientific and industrial advancements, it is improbable that completely automated, SAE-level 5-compliant cars will become widely available in the near future. Instead, automated driving solutions are likely to rely on remote monitoring and teleoperation assistance for the foreseeable time. While Virtual Reality (VR) has been proposed as one potential interface for the teleoperation of remote vehicles, its benefits and challenges are not yet sufficiently understood. In this context, we discuss replicated conditions across two of our user studies [10].Study 1 (n=24) compared the physical interface with an interface optimized for monitoring, once displayed on a 56-inch screen and once in VR on HTC Vive Pro 2. Study 2 (n=24) compared this optimized interface displayed on the same 56-inch screen, HTC Vive Pro 2, and Meta Quest Pro.