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Tesla’s safety scoring system may be designed to encourage drivers to drive their vehicles very carefully, but according to Consumer Reports, the new metric could actually make roads less safe. While gamification of safe driving behavior might work, the magazine argued that Tesla’s safety scores could also trick drivers into cheating the system to get a high rating.
Kelly Funkhouser, responsible for automated and connected vehicle testing at Consumer Reports, noted that when she and her team tested the safety scoring system on their Tesla Model Y, they consistently exceeded the “Hard Braking” metric of the metric. Avoiding such hard braking scenarios led Consumer Reports testers to cross an intersection or not come to a full stop for a pedestrian.
“The problem is, Tesla seems to be using some of the wrong metrics. Without more context, the data that Tesla is collecting and scoring could create the wrong incentives, ”Funkhouser said.
Jake Fisher, senior director of Consumer Reports’ automotive test center, added that gamification of the safety system could bring positive benefits and motivate drivers to adopt good driving habits. Fisher, however, noted that gamification also has a “dark side,” which was observed by researchers at Ohio State University. When college teachers added gamification to the classroom, students ended up being more likely to cheat to earn rewards.
The same could happen to Tesla’s safety score, according to the director of the CR Automatic Test Center. With the safety scoring system as it is today, drivers can simply be encouraged to find other ways to achieve a high score. “Drivers want to access the so-called full self-driving software for which they’ve already paid up to $ 10,000, so they may be willing to play around with the system to get a pretty good score,” Fisher said.
Granted, Tesla’s safety scores are still in their infancy, and Elon Musk himself noted that the system is still a beta calculation today. Musk noted that safety scores would need to evolve over time to accurately predict the likelihood of an accident. Funkhouser, for its part, suggested that Tesla optimize its safety score measures as soon as possible. She also suggested adding other metrics to the safety scoring system, such as vehicle speed.
“Tesla vehicles, more than most other cars on the road, can get the context of a ride – why a driver is applying the brakes, if a light is about to turn, what the road conditions are like – but the security score ignores it. Braking to avoid a cyclist or a pedestrian doesn’t make you a bad driver, ”she said.
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