Usability Trials of Alternative Child Restraint Attachment Systems

This paper describes usability trials conducted to determine the ease of use and incidence of misuse of four alternative child restraint/vehicle attachment systems compared to the current system attached via the vehicle seat belt and a top tether. The accuracy of use of each of the alternative systems was significantly higher than the conventional system, and the 76 participants reported they were much easier to use. Systems which utilise the ISOFIX pins were used without difficulty by participants who had no prior experience with this concept. The systems which depend on the users to tighten side straps on the child restraints were improperly installed more frequently than the ISOFIX pin systems.