New Study Reveals Public’s Lack of Trust in Driverless Vehicles

A new study by Fleet Alliance has identified that the UK public does not yet have full confidence in autonomous (self-driving) vehicles.

1,750 British individuals aged 18-65+ were surveyed, resulting in an astounding majority of all respondents revealing that they would not feel safer in a self-driving vehicle when compared to a human driver-controlled one.

The exact question which was put to respondents was: What Type of Vehicle Would You Feel Safest Travelling In?

A large majority (just under two-thirds) indicated that they would feel safest in a human-driven vehicle. Whereas, only 1 in 6 stated that they would feel safest in a self-driving vehicle. The public answered as follows (Please contact us for a full copy of all the results):

Difference Between Ages and Genders

When analysing the answers between respondents there are some clear trends worthy of note.

Female Drivers

Female respondents had noticeably higher confidence in human-driven vehicles than men.

* Females trust human-driven vehicles 10% more than their tech-trusting male counterparts.

Over 65s

Respondents over 65 year olds had by far the highest confidence in human-driven vehicles.

* Individuals over 65 are 17% more likely than 18-24 year olds to trust a human driver the most.

Reasons For Responses

When looking into the reasons why people might not want to be transported in a driverless vehicle, a recent study of 2,134 individuals by Aviva provides some insights:

1.  Would rather be in control: 42%
2.  Wouldn’t trust the tech: 41%
3.  Don’t understand enough about them: 9%
4.  Concerned about being on the roads with non-driverless cars: 7%

The reasons given above indicate that car manufacturers have huge barriers to overcome before launching self-driving vehicles successfully. If the public’s lack of confidence and concerns aren’t addressed it seems likely that autonomous vehicles will be a commercial flop.

The marginally highest individual reason of ‘I would rather be in control’ is a personal preference. This is something which is very hard to overcome or change with simple marketing and PR. So immediately a large proportion of the market is isolated from the product.

However, not trusting the technology and not knowing enough about autonomous vehicles can be changed with consumer education. The individuals who responded with answers (2) and (3) above are the target market for car manufacturers to win over. These two respondent groups make up 50% of the market who currently don’t want to use a driverless vehicle. Therefore there’s a big pool of potential buyers waiting to be won over.

The Facts on Self-Driving Vehicles

We discussed where driverless technology is heading with Alain Dunoyer PHD from SBD Automotive, a leading research body on automotive technology.