A method for controlling a gear change in response to a change in a
driving mode, the method comprising: (a) determining a maximum number of permissible low gearshift steps according to a result of determining a state of a transmission based on information about an accelerator pedal operation (a
signal from an accelerator pedal
position sensor (APS; 20)) when a request to change a
driving mode to a sport mode is detected during driving, (b) calculating a
turbine wheel speed expected immediately after the gear change for each stage included in the maximum number of permissible low gear shift stages using a current speed of an output shaft of the transmission and a
gear ratio of each stage, and comparing the calculated expected
turbine wheel speed (a speed of an input shaft of the transmission) with a preset permissible
turbine wheel speed for each stage, (c) setting the lowest gear shift step from gear shift steps for which the expected turbine speed and the permissible turbine speed satisfy a predetermined condition, such that it is a target gear shift step within the maximum number of permissible low gear shift steps, and (d) executing a gear shift control to downshift a current gear shift stage to the target gear shift stage, wherein in (a) determining the maximum number of permissible low gearshift steps, if an output
signal of an APS (20) is at or above a set value at a time when the request to change the
driving mode is detected, it is determined that the transmission is in an engaged state, and if the output
signal of the APS (20) is below the set value, it is determined that the transmission is in a disengaged state, wherein, when the transmission is in the engaged state, the number of low gearshift steps lower than a set gearshift step determined via a gearshift pattern associated with a sport mode is determined as the maximum number of permissible low gearshift steps, and when the transmission is in the disengaged state, the maximum number of permissible low gearshift steps is determined as 1, such that a low gearshift is only possible to a low gearshift step (a set gearshift
step number minus 1) that is one step lower than the set gearshift step determined via the gearshift pattern associated with the sport mode.