Public Acceptance of Autonomous Vehicles in China

Abstract

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) have attracted extensive attention worldwide for their huge potential to revolutionize urban cities. The diffusion of AVs in cities will largely depend on public acceptance of AVs. But many studies revealed that people hold a high level of concern about AVs. This study aims to enrich our understanding of public acceptance of AVs in China, both at the explicit level and at the implicit level. We also attempt to enhance people’s positive attitudes toward AVs by Evaluative Conditioning (EC). Study 1 found that participants recognized the benefits of AVs, but were also concerned about them. Moreover, participants showed only moderate trust in AVs. In Study 2, it was observed that participants mainly showed positive implicit attitudes toward AVs and there was no significant correlation between implicit and explicit attitudes toward AVs. In Study 3, EC offered an alternative way to change implicit attitudes. Specifically, implicit attitudes toward AVs were positively increased through EC, whereas explicit attitudes did not change significantly. This research provides several theoretical and practical implications. The findings support the notion that explicit and implicit attitudes involve independent psychological processes, and that implicit attitude can be changed through EC.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this research are available at the Open Science Framework (OSF; https://osf.io/xzjh9/?view_only=05753aafce7e4810a90ff60e4a34ab53) for peer review.

Additional information

Funding

This research is supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China Grant 71873133.

Notes on contributors

Chaojun Luo

Chaojun Luo Master of Psychology, Renmin University of China. Senior marketing manager of GAC Honda Automobile Co., Ltd. Research focuses on how human-computer interaction is affected by emotional and cognitive processes.

Menglin He

Menglin He is an undergraduate student at the Department of Psychology of Renmin University of China. Her research interests include social cognition, judgement and decision-making.

Cai Xing

Cai Xing in Psychology at Brandies University, MA, USA. Currently she is a Professor of Psychology at Renmin University of China. Professor Cai Xing is an ad-hoc reviewer for peer-reviewed journals including Emotion, Cognition and Emotion, Emotion and Motivation, etc. She specializes in decision-making of various psychological processes.