SURROUNDINGS MONITOR FOR VEHICLE

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a surroundings monitor for a vehicle, which warns a driver as needed in consideration of a risk degree of collision between the vehicle and an obstacle, or detection reliability of the obstacle. SOLUTION: The surroundings monitor for the vehicle includes: an image acquisition unit that acquires an image of vehicle surroundings; and a signal processing unit processing the image acquired by the image acquisition unit. The signal processing unit includes: an obstacle recognition unit that recognizes an obstacle in the image acquired by the image acquisition unit, calculates a position of the obstacle, and calculates a detection reliability indicating accuracy of recognition of the obstacle; a risk degree calculation unit that calculates a risk degree that indicates a degree of risk of a collision between the obstacle and the vehicle; a detection reliability correction value calculating unit that corrects the detection reliability according to the risk degree and calculates the detection reliability correction value; and a warning unit that outputs a warning signal for warning the driver only when the detection reliability correction value exceeds a threshold. COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT