The impact of two computer-aided emotion regulation strategies on risky driving behaviors in a virtual environment

Abstract

Computer technology has been increasingly used to enhance driving safety, however, as a risk factor for driving safety, how anger can be effectively controlled by computer technology remains to be explored. Thus, the present study tested the impact of two computer-aided emotion regulation strategies (expressive suppression vs. cognitive reappraisal) on anger and risky driving behaviors in a virtual environment. After anger was triggered, participants were instructed by pre-set computer recording segments to use the above two strategies for emotion regulation. During driving, their facial expressions were recorded by a camera. It was found that only computer-aided expressive suppression could effectively regulate anger and reduce risky driving behaviors (i.e., angular overspeed and lateral acceleration overspeed). These findings suggest that the computer-aided expressive suppression has the potential to reduce risky driving behaviors for Chinese drivers and offer insights for the development of computer-aided approaches.

Keywords: Cognitive reappraisal; Emotion regulation; Expressive suppression; Risky driving behaviors; Virtual environment.

Fig. 1

The driving environment settings

Fig. 2

Experimental procedure. (A) Driving scene. (B) Emotion regulation instructions. (C) Two blocks

Fig. 3

Results of the facial expression and the risky driving behaviors for three groups. (A) The max activation intensity of AU5 for three groups. (B) The angular speed at bending roads for three groups. (C) The lateral acceleration speed at bending roads for three groups. Lateral acc refers to the lateral acceleration speed. Angular S refers to the angular speed. Error bars indicate ± standard error