Sick of Scents: Investigating Non-invasive Olfactory Motion Sickness Mitigation in Automated Driving

While automated vehicles are supposed to become places for purposes beyond transportation, motion sickness is still a largely unsolved issue that may be critical for this transformation. Due to its previously shown positive impact on the gastric and central nervous system, we hypothesize that olfaction (in particular the scents of lavender and ginger) may be able to reduce motion sickness symptoms in a non-invasive manner. We investigate the effects of these scents on the driver-passenger in chauffeured drives in a test track study with a reading-span non-driving related task. Evaluation of self-rated (Simulator Sickness Questionnaire, UX Curves) and physiologically measured motion sickness (Electrogastrography, Electrocardiography), and observations are presented and discussed. Results indicate that the issued scents were detrimental to the well-being of participants in the comparisons between post-task (baseline, scented) and pre-test measurements, with symptoms in the lavender-scented group being perceived as slightly less harsh than in the ginger-scented group.