Following intensive field research based on over 5000 vehicles [1], it was shown that 5% of the drivers still do not wear any seatbelts. New vehicles are now being fitted with active safety features which will influence the kinematics of these un-restrained drivers [2] and may have important safety implications.

The proposed study assesses the safety benefit of a pre-braking event on the occupant position, stance and injury and will review the contribution of active muscle behaviour of a 50th percentile human model [3] in comparison with a passive human model [4] and discusses the potential using active human simulation for testing driver assistance safety technologies.