John Gaspar, PhD, is the director of human factors research at the Driving Safety Research Institute. His areas of expertise include human factors and human performance, cognition and attention, vehicle automation, driving simulation, and cognitive aging.

Gaspar serves as the principal investigator on three NHTSA projects. The first two examine human interaction with automated vehicles, focusing on HMI design for safe and efficient transition of control. The third evaluates drowsiness countermeasures in the context of long overnight drives.

He has recently led several other studies on human interaction with automated driving systems. These studies have utilized a combination of methodologies, including naturalistic and on-road data collection and high-fidelity human-in-the-loop simulation. In addition, he has led projects on driver state detection, driver impairment, and distraction. His research employs a multimodal approach to analyzing human behavior in automated vehicles. This includes manual video coding, eye tracking, behavioral analysis, and cognitive task analysis.

He is currently a member of the Transportation Research Board, Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, and Society of Automotive Engineers.

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