Modelling Public Perception and Acceptance of Autonomous Vehicles

Without mass public acceptance of autonomous vehicles (AVs), the expected benefits of them will not be realized. This thesis develops a new simulation tool and explores the factors that influence the acceptance of AVs. To this end, the thesis contributions include comprehensive bibliometric and scientometric analyses of AV research in the literature, the development of a new on-road virtual reality autonomous vehicle (VRAV) simulator, as well as several studies to explore the effect of the experience of an AV using VR on the acceptance of AVs, and to develop AV acceptance model based on perceived value of time and motion sickness, and integrate the diffusion of innovations (DOI) constructs, trust, perceived cost and attitude into the proposed model.