The effectiveness of virtual reality snowplow simulator training for current Iowa Department of Transportation employees was examined. Operators received approximately two hours of training, which included several drives in a driving simulator designed to emulate a snowplow. Performance on a test scenario was compared for operators who had received this training versus those who were trained after the test scenario. Participants also completed a variety of personality and training questionnaires designed to measure personality tendencies, as well as their opinions of training and the realism of the simulator. Responses to these questionnaires were generally positive: operators reported that the features of the simulator mimicked those of a real snowplow, and that they enjoyed all aspects of training. Moreover, several performance differences (e.g., number of collisions, average speed and fuel consumption) were found between trained and untrained operators. They suggest that snowplow simulator training improved the driving performance of trained operators.
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