Research & Discoveries (R&D): Awareness of AVs’ Capabilities Improves Consumer Support

Academics and experts around the world are studying how AVs can improve safety, enhance mobility, and create new economic opportunities, among other transformative benefits. AVIA’s Research & Discoveries (R&D) Series highlights these reports’ findings about how AVs can create a safer and more mobile world.

Need To Know (NTK): Learning About AVs’ Societal Benefits Boosts Support for the Technology

Johns Hopkins University researchers conducted a study on public trust in AVs. Based on their experiments, participants’ support for the technology “nearly doubles” when they are informed about AVs’ societal benefits. 

HYPOTHESIS: LEARNING ABOUT AVS’ SOCIETAL BENEFITS BOOSTS ACCEPTANCE
In the opening abstract of the study – published in the peer-reviewed journal Health Equity – Johns Hopkins University researchers emphasized a major benefit of AVs: “Motor vehicle crashes are a leading cause of death in the United States, and disproportionately impact communities of color. Replacing human control with automated vehicles (AVs) holds the potential to reduce crashes and save lives.” 

While the report’s authors acknowledged that AVs can help shift the unsafe status quo on U.S. roadways, they instead set out to test a different premise: whether emphasizing the technology’s mobility and accessibility benefits would improve public perception of AVs.

FINDINGS: HYPOTHESIS CONFIRMED
To test their hypothesis, the researchers asked over 2,000 respondents questions about their existing beliefs and feelings toward AVs. Then, they introduced prospective benefits AVs would bring to disadvantaged groups.

Based on their findings, participants in the study were more likely to support AVs when they realized that, once deployed, the technology would help vulnerable communities.

• Following the description that AVs would help older adults, support for AVs increased to nearly 50% while opposition fell to less than 20%.

• Following the description that AVs would help low-income individuals, support for AVs increased to above 50% while opposition fell below 20%.

• Following the description that AVs would help the vision impaired, support for AVs increased to nearly 55% while opposition fell to around 15%

CONCLUSION
Emphasizing the social equity benefits of AVs can measurably improve people’s perception of AVs. "Our study shows that when highlighting how AVs can improve vulnerable populations' ability to get around, support for the technology nearly doubles. This tells us that the way we frame the conversation about autonomous vehicles cultivates widespread acceptance,” said Johns Hopkins’ Tak Igusa.

As the authors also point out, public acceptance of AVs is critical to broad deployment and adoption in the U.S.: “[I]n the end, the public's trust and support are absolutely integral for successful deployment of AVs. Our approach may hold the key to changing those attitudes."  AVIA agrees that public trust in AVs is essential, and that is why we created the TRUST Principles to demonstrate industry commitment in this critical area.

As this study shows, when people are aware of AVs’ potential to improve mobility opportunities, support for the technology increases. That’s why it’s incumbent on policymakers, industry groups, and other stakeholders to help Americans fully grasp how the deployment of AV technology will positively impact society.