Vehicle control system and vehicle control method

A vehicle control method executed by a computer to control operation of a vehicle having a notification function, the vehicle control method comprising:

• a vehicle peripheral condition recognition step of recognizing a condition around the vehicle by a vehicle peripheral condition recognizing unit that recognizes the condition around the vehicle based on an image taken by an off-vehicle photographing camera which photographs a periphery of an outside of the vehicle;
• an in-vehicle condition recognition step of recognizing a condition inside the vehicle by an in-vehicle condition recognizing unit that recognizes the condition inside the vehicle based on an image imaged by an in-vehicle photographing camera which photographs an inside of the vehicle;
• and
• a notification control step of, when a person outside the vehicle is recognized, from the image taken by the off-vehicle photographing camera, in the vehicle peripheral condition recognition step and an in-vehicle user is recognized, from the image imaged by the in-vehicle photographing camera, in the in-vehicle condition recognition step, performing notification processing on outside of the vehicle by using the notification function based on predetermined information relating to the in-vehicle user or an action of at least one of the person and the in-vehicle user,
• wherein in the notification control step, based on a recognition result of the in-vehicle condition recognizing step and the vehicle peripheral condition recognizing step:
• stop performing the notification processing when it is determined that the in-vehicle user takes a first action, which is a predetermined action indicating that the person outside the vehicle is an acquaintance, toward the person outside the vehicle and the person outside the vehicle takes a second action, which is a predetermined action indicating that the person inside the vehicle is an acquaintance, corresponding to the first action;
• and
• perform the notification processing when it is determined that the in-vehicle user takes the first action toward the person outside the vehicle and the person outside the vehicle does not take the second action.