Tesla FSD Autopilot Results to Drivers’ Inattentiveness on the Road: MIT Study

Tesla FSD, or full self-driving autopilot feature, appears to result in the inattentiveness of drivers on the road, a recent MIT study found out.

Tesla FSD Autopilot

It is worth noting that the Tesla FSD is expected to be widely released to more users of the electric vehicle giant on Sept. 24.

However, Elon Musk highlighted that only the drivers that will exhibit good behavior for a week will get to experience it as the FSD Beta button rolls out in just a few days.

Tesla will be using the system of its insurance calculator to boot out irresponsible drivers from the FSD Beta.

Still, with the release of the Tesla FSD coming, the safety authorities of the United States remain unimpressed with its development, adding that they are still worried about the safety of its users.

To be precise, the new head of the National Transportation Safety Board or the NTSB, Jennifer Homendy, said, last Sept. 19, that the autopilot feature on the EVs of Musk's firm still needs to improve its basic safety features before expanding.

The pronouncement of the NTSD head comes as the Tesla FSD has been involved in numerous accidents, leading to some deaths and injuries.

Meanwhile, it is important to point out that the FSD package of the EV titan still requires its drivers to hold the wheel, as well as full alertness, contrary to its name, as per Engadget.

Simply put, the Tesla autopilot only serves as an assist system function, rather than making the vehicle fully autonomous.

Tesla FSD Autopilot and Driver Attentiveness

The recent study of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, revealed that the concerns of the safety authorities seem to be in right place.

The data of the MIT researchers showed that the Tesla FSD or Autopilot system ruined the attentiveness of the person behind the wheel.

Engadget further noted in the same report that it is not actually surprising that the Tesla drivers end up being inattentive while the FSD is turned on.

However, the MIT research is the first study that proves such an assumption.

The study specifically looked into both the behavior of the Tesla driver before and after turning on the autopilot or FSD. That said, there was data that could compare the attentiveness of motorists with the assist system and without it.

The research data went on to reveal that drivers using the autopilot on the EV glanced more towards the infotainment touchscreen and even downwards.

The latter presumably means that the driver is looking at their smartphone.

The MIT paper also disclosed that the drivers that were manually controlling the vehicle without the autopilot in place, looked less on the info system and downwards.

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Teejay Boris