Drive mode switching control device, method and program

A drive mode switching control device for switching a drive mode of a vehicle from an automatic drive mode to a manual drive mode, the drive mode switching control device comprising a processor configured with a program to perform operations comprising:

• operation as an acquisition unit configured to acquire sensing data representing a state of a driver from a monitoring sensor configured to monitor the state of the driver;
• operation as a driver state determination unit configured to regularly or irregularly determine, based on the acquired sensing data, whether the state of the driver is a state of being able to perform a driving operation in the manual drive mode and produce a determination result thereof, and hold the determination result;
• operation as an operation determination unit configured to determine whether an operation performed by the driver is an emergency override operation or a non-emergency override operation, based on a detection signal outputted from an in-vehicle sensor configured to detect a driving operation by the driver;
• operation as a first switching signal output unit configured to output a switching signal for switching the automatic drive mode to the manual drive mode in response to the determination result by operation as the driver state determination unit, before detection of the emergency override operation, being that the state of the driver is the state of being able to perform the driving operation in the manual drive mode, in a case where the determination result by operation as the operation determination unit is the emergency override operation;
• and
• operation as a second switching signal output unit configured to output the switching signal in response to the determination result by operation as the driver state determination unit, after detection of the non-emergency override operation, being that the state of the driver is the state of being able to perform the driving operation in the manual drive mode, in a case where the determination result by operation as the operation determination unit is the non-emergency override operation, wherein
• the processor is configured with the program to perform operations such that operation as the operation determination unit comprises:
• operation as a first detector configured to detect an override operation by the driver based on the detection signal;
• operation as a second detector configured to detect a value based on an operation amount of the driving operation based on the detection signal;
• and
• operation as a threshold determination unit configured to determine whether the override operation detected by operation as the first detector is an emergency operation, in accordance with whether the value based on the operation amount detected by operation as the second detector is equal to or more than a threshold value, and
• the value based on the operation amount comprises an operation acceleration value obtained by differentiating an operation amount of the driving operation twice.