Perceived Risks of Autonomous Vehicles

Abstract

Whilst self-driving cars are not vehicles of the future, but technology that is already available, their acceptance and implementation is heavily limited. People consider them as technology that has a lot of risk—be it technological, IT related, or even ethical. The aim of the present paper is to enrich the existing body of literature of risk perception—and in line with this technology adaption—regarding autonomous vehicles and how they are influenced by demographic and exogenous cultural variables. Whilst the effect of cultural variables on risk perception has already been explored by several researchers, the present paper shall be considered an expansion of those works, striving to address a particular segment of risk perception—the specifics of cultural influence on risk perception regarding autonomous vehicles. Whilst risk perception is of a multifaceted nature, the current paper does not aim to provide a comprehensive understanding of the complex phenomenon under scrutiny, but intends to highlight the potentiality of cultural influences besides the often-explored individual variables when it comes to risk perception and the consequent decisions and indicates that the cultural dimensions of Geert Hofstede use to create a better understanding of perceived risks related to self-driving cars.

Predicting User Preference for Innovative Features in Intelligent Connected Vehicles from a Cultural Perspective

“…Past studies have shown that Chinese people's behaviors are largely influenced by people in their interpersonal circle because China is a society with high collectivism culture, so demographic variables are closely related to user preferences [23,25,42,47]. In addition, users' past experience of using ICVs will help form their own attitude toward preferences of innovative HMI features in the subsequent use process [3,22].…”

“…Although other scholars have introduced new models to measure culture's consequences, they have not been as effective as Hofstede's six dimensions. Some studies have also proved that the influence of basic human factors such as gender and age cannot be ignored while researching culture [23,42].…”

The Influence of Cultural Factors on Choosing Low-Emission Passenger Cars

“…The model has been used in various sectors and for various perspectives; for example, for the prediction of proenvironmental behaviour in hospitality and tourism [44], changing the organisational culture to increase innovation and productivity [45], understanding the perceived risks related to self-driving cars [46], etc.…”