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Invited Speaker: A User Centred Approach to Designing Future Self-Driving Transport Systems: Evidence from Public Trials and Engagement

Date and Time: Tuesday, July 11, 2023: 8:00 AM - 10:00 AM

Rebecca Posner 

Head of Social Behavioral Research, Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles

Presentation Description

The Great Self Driving Exploration research project undertaken by the UK Government’s Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles explored public attitudes to self-driving vehicles like never before, seeing the first deployments in rural areas of the UK, the most diverse deliberative research sample and the first study to ever monitor people’s actual emotional responses to trialling self-driving vehicles in real-time.

This study completed over the course of 2022 was explicitly designed to allow people from all walks of life to engage with self-driving vehicles, understand how they might affect their lives, their potential for addressing existing transport challenges and explore differences between groups and locations. It involved more than 1,000 people experiencing different types of automated vehicles (two-person pod and ten-person shuttle) operating on public roads in mixed traffic at three sites across England, both rural and urban, along with an innovative deliberative research approach, involving a diverse sample of over 200 people and 90 hours of engagement

Taking a user centred approach, the research set out to answer three key questions: what do the public want from self-driving vehicles? How do we build a publicly acceptable self-driving future? How can we address concerns, improve awareness and understanding of self-driving vehicles? The study focussed on building an understanding of:
• Public attitudes, barriers, concerns and transport needs and how these vary across different segments of the population.
• Perception towards self-driving vehicles and explore if self-driving technologies could help to address local transport challenges
• People’s experience of a self-driving journey through the use of physiological data
• How to communicate safety information about self-driving vehicles effectively and what information do the public need
• How different types of exposure can influence awareness, understanding and perceptions of self-driving vehicles
• What role self-driving vehicles could play in a future transport system as well as expectations and requirements for their successful deployment

The results from the study are being used by the UK Department for Transport to understand the use cases that will bring the greatest societal value, and how to manage the introduction of AVs to ensure concerns such as safety, accessibility and costs are suitably addressed. This session will present the findings from this study and how we can use these to tackle key questions like:

• How do we address the public’s concerns towards self-driving vehicles?
• What use cases are the highest priority for the public?
• Requirements for the successful introduction and uptake of self-driving vehicles.

Speaker Biography

Rebecca is an experienced behavioural and transport psychologist and the Head of Social and Behavioural Research within the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles where she is leading the UK Government’s programmes of social and human factors research and behavioural change in relation to self-driving vehicles. As part of this she focuses on using innovative research methods and applying behavioural science to understand the needs and concerns of all transport users and embedding these into the development of future transport systems (vehicles, infrastructure and services) ensuring that the UK is taking a user centred approach to automated transport systems. She also advises and works closely with industry and academia to ensure the best scientific and research principles are adhered too in government and grant funded research, including acting as an advisory board member to UK and EU funded projects. Her work builds the actionable evidence that enables the development of the most relevant interventions relating to automated transport systems including policies, regulations and standards.

Presentation File