It was the aim of this research to develop a warning strategy for a driving assistance system which gives information to the driver about a pending critical driving situation relating to the friction potential.

Driver behaviour was analyzed in order to determine the driving strategy for different drivers under various conditions related to safety limits. The knowledge achieved was used for the development of Warning strategies and drivervehicle information interfaces.

To estimate driver behaviour the ergonomic concept of stress and strain was applied. Stress (task and environment) and performance (eg. vehicles acceleration and speed) are measured in order to identify relations between task parameters and the behaviour of different subjects.

The behaviour of the test persons was evaluated on different levels depending on parameters of the task (route) and the human being. It can be assumed that driver performance is influenced by certain route properties.

The safety margin, respectively the use of the friction potential in the lateral direction, was primarily used as the most important safety parameter for the development of information, support and warning strategies.

The human information processing and control mechanisrns used during car driving were considered in the search and for evaluation of possibilities to inform the driver. The Visual, auditory and haptic (kinesthetic and tactile) channels have been considered.

An active accelerator pedal yielded the best result to transmit an information to the driver. The most detectable signals were the combination of haptic and acoustic signals, which gave the best support for the driver.

For driver groups of different experience, different information levels, which were based on the individual use of lateral acceleration potential, were defined and used for Warnings.

This research project has been funded under the EUREKA programme PROMETHEUS by the German Federal Minister for Research and Technology and contributed to the ROSES project of the EU~funded DRIVE II programme.

The work was conducted Within a cooperation of two institutions of Darmstadt University (Technische Hochschule Darmstadt THD):​ Department of Automotive Engineering (fzd, Fachgebiet Fahrzeugtechnik, Prof. Dr.-Ing. B. Breuer) and Institute of Ergonomics (IAD, Institut für Arbeitswissenschaft, Prof. Dr.-Ing. W. Rohmert) with Porsche AG, as industrial partner.