Interpreting pedestrians' head movements when encountering automated vehicles at a virtual crossroad

In the future, Automated Vehicles (AVs) may be able to use pedestrians’ head movement patterns to understand their crossing intentions. This ability of the AV to predict pedestrian crossing intention will improve road safety in mixed traffic situations and may also enhance traffic flow, allowing the vehicle to gradually reduce its speed in advance of a yield, eliminating the need for a complete and erratic halt. To date, most of the work conducted on studying pedestrian head movements has been based on observation studies. To further our understanding in this area, this study examined pedestrians' head movements when interacting with AVs during a range of road crossing scenarios, developed in a VR environment. Thirty-eight participants took part in this CAVE-based pedestrian simulator study. Head movements were recorded using stereoscopic motion-tracking glasses, as pedestrians crossed the road in response to an AV which approached from the right (UK-based road). A zebra crossing was included in half of the trials to understand how it affected crossing behaviour. The effect of different approaching speeds of the AV, and the presence of an external Human-Machine Interface (eHMI), on head movements and crossing behaviour was also studied. Results showed that the absolute head-turning rate (change in pedestrians' head-turning angle, per frame) increased significantly at around 1 s before a crossing initiation, reaching a peak at the crossing initiation, where pedestrians presented a “last-second check” before the crossing decision. Another increase in absolute head-turning rate to the right was seen at the end of the crossing (∼1.5 s after crossing initiation), to check the proximity of the approaching vehicle. A higher rate of head-turning was also seen for AV-non-yielding scenarios. Finally, the least number of head turns was seen for the yielding conditions which included an eHMI, in the presence of the zebra crossing. These results show the value of infrastructural and vehicle-based cues in assisting pedestrians’ crossing decisions and provide an insight into how head-turning behaviour can be used by AVs to better predict pedestrians’ crossing intentions in urban settings.