Transportation Research Part C 100 (2019) 306–317

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Transportation Research Part C

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Willingness to pay for self-driving vehicles: Influences of

T
demographic and psychological factors
Peng Liua, , Qianru Guoa, Fei Renb, Lin Wangc, Zhigang Xub,
⁎ ⁎

a
College of Management and Economics, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, PR China
b
School of Information Engineering, Chang’an University, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710064, PR China
c
Department of Library and Information Science, Incheon National University, 119 Academy-ro, Yeonsu-gu, Incheon 406-772, South Korea

ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT

Keywords: Research on willingness to pay (WTP) can provide practical insights for assessing the value of
Self-driving vehicles self-driving vehicle (SDV) technology in the vehicle market. Are people willing to pay extra for
Willingness to pay the technology? What demographic and psychological factors can influence people’s WTP for this
Trust in SDVs technology? These questions are not yet well investigated. We conducted surveys in two cities in
Perceived benefit
China (total N = 1355) and examined WTP and its potential demographic determinants (famil-
Perceived dread
Perceived risk
iarity, age, gender, education, and income) and psychological determinants (perceived benefit
and risk of SDVs, anticipated perceived dread riding in SDVs, and trust in SDVs). About 26.3% of
participants were unwilling to pay extra, 39.3% were willing to pay less than $2900, and the
remaining 34.3% were willing to pay more than $2900. Younger and highly educated partici-
pants with higher-income were willing to pay more. Participants who had heard about SDVs
before the survey reported higher WTP and higher trust and perceived higher benefits, lower
risks, and lower dread. Trust and perceived benefit were positive predictors of WTP and per-
ceived risk and perceived dread were negative predictors of WTP. Our results may offer practical
implications for increasing the public’s acceptance and WTP of SDVs.

1. Introduction

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) refer to those in which at least some aspects of a safety–critical control function (e.g., steering,
braking) are conducted by an automated system without a human driver’s input (NHTSA, 2013). According to the Society of Au-
tomotive Engineers’ (SAE) taxonomy for vehicle automation (SAE, 2014), vehicles with conditional automation (Level 3), high
automation (Level 4), and full automation (Level 5) can work in the “self-driving” (i.e., “automated driving” or “driverless”) mode.
SAE’s Level 5 AVs are also called self-driving vehicles (SDVs) or fully autonomous vehicles (FAVs) in which the automated system
performs all driving tasks under all conditions that are traditionally managed by a human driver. Mass adoption of AVs has great
potential to improve traffic safety and mobility (NHTSA, 2016). With electrification, shared mobility, and connectivity innovations,
AVs may have profound environmental benefits in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and energy use (Anderson et al., 2016;
Greenblatt and Saxena, 2015). AVs also pose a new set of challenges regarding safety, security, legal liability, and regulation issues
(Liu et al., in press-b; Marchau and Zmud, in press). For example, current road tests have not confirmed the safety of AVs over
conventional vehicles (Banerjee et al., 2018; Favarò et al., 2017).
Technological innovations in the AV industry alone may not be sufficient to reform the current transportation system. For any

⁎
Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: pengliu@tju.edu.cn (P. Liu), xuzhigang@chd.edu.cn (Z. Xu).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trc.2019.01.022
Received 10 August 2018; Received in revised form 30 December 2018; Accepted 19 January 2019
Available online 05 February 2019
0968-090X/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
P. Liu et al. Transportation Research Part C 100 (2019) 306–317

emerging technology, we need to evaluate and forecast the public’s perceptions, beliefs, attitudes, and acceptance of the technology
early in the design and development process (Davis et al., 1989; Fraedrich and Lenz, 2016). Recent studies have documented these
issues associated with AVs (Abraham et al., 2017; Bansal et al., 2016; Haboucha et al., 2017; Howard and Dai, 2014; Kyriakidis et al.,
2015; Nordhoff et al., 2018a; Payre et al., 2014; Schoettle and Sivak, 2014a). People’s intention to buy and use AVs would be
determined by their trust in and knowledge of this technology (Buckley et al., 2018; Ward et al., 2017; Xu et al., 2018; Zhang et al.,
2019), perceived usefulness (Buckley et al., 2018; Choi and Ji, 2015; Madigan et al., 2017; Xu et al., 2018; Zhang et al., 2019) and
ease of use related to this technology (Xu et al., 2018), and affective responses (e.g., anxiety and pleasure) towards the technology
(Hohenberger et al., 2016, 2017; Winter et al., 2018). Recent works had largely advanced our understanding about public acceptance
of and attitude towards future AVs.
As an important indicator of acceptance, people’s willingness to pay (WTP) for AV technology has attracted certain scholar
attention (see Table 1 in Section 2). One reason would be that it could provide important insights for the valuation of this technology.
Surprisingly, we are lacking a clear understanding about WTP associated with this technology, especially, about the determinants of
WTP (see Section 2). This study focuses on two questions: Are people willing to pay extra for SDV technology? What demographic and
psychological factors can influence people’s WTP for this technology?

2. Literature review and hypotheses development

2.1. Willingness to pay

Several surveys (see Table 1) have investigated the public’s WTP for adding AV technology to their next vehicle. Existing results
can be understood from two perspectives. First, are people willing to pay extra for AV technology? The percentage of participants
unwilling to pay ranged from 22% (Kyriakidis et al., 2015) to more than 50% (Bansal and Kockelman, 2017). Particularly, Schoettle
and Sivak (2014a) showed that 21.6% and 29.8% participants from China and India, respectively, were unwilling to pay more for
SDV technology, whereas more than 50% of participants from four developed countries (Japan, US, UK, and Australia) were un-
willing to pay (see Table 1). Thus, certain inconsistencies were reported. We should consider national differences while investigating
potential consumers’ WTP. In addition, even conducted in the same nation, surveys could report different levels of WTP. For instance,
three surveys in the U.S., Bansal et al. (2016), Bansal and Kockelman (2018), and Daziano et al. (2017), found that their participants’
WTP for SDVs was $7253, $7589, and $4900, respectively (see Table 1). As WTP could be largely influenced by economic factors,
between-nation comparison may not focus on the specific amount of WTP, but on the percentage of people unwilling (willing) to pay
extra for this technology.
Second, what factors could influence individuals’ WTP? Previous studies noted the differences in WTP for different automation

Table 1
Summary of selected WTP research on autonomous vehicles.
Reference Method Major findings

Payre et al. (2014) 421 French drivers; online survey Participants were willing to spend an extra 1624€ on average for SDV technology

Schoettle and Sivak (2014a)
Participants from US, UK, Australia, China,
India, and Japan; online survey
Most participants in China and India would be willing to pay something extra for
SDV technology (a response of $0 was given by only 21.6% and 29.8%,
respectively). However, most participants in Japan, US, UK, and Australia said
they would not be willing to pay extra for this technology, with 54.5% of U.S.
participants (lowest) to 67.5% of Japanese participants (highest) reporting $0

Kyriakidis et al. (2015) 5000 participants from 109 countries; 22% did not want to pay for an SDV system; 5% were willing to pay more than
online survey $30,000

Bansal et al. (2016) 347 Americans; online survey Higher-income, technology-savvy men, who live in urban areas, and those who
have experienced more crashes have a greater interest in and higher WTP for
adding full automation ($7253) and partial automation ($3300)

Bansal and Kockelman 2167 Americans; online survey More than 50% were unwilling to pay for full automation or limited self-driving
(2017) automation. Among those who were willing to pay, their average WTP was
$5,470 for limited automation and $14,196 for full automation

Daziano et al. (2017) 1260 Americans; choice experiment; online About $3500 for partial automation and $4900 for full automation. However,
survey many households are not willing to pay anything for full automation

Abraham et al. (2017) 3034 Americans; online survey Older adults were less comfortable with the idea of self-driving vehicles and
expressed less willingness to pay for this technology

Bansal and Kockelman 1088 Americans; online survey Texans are willing to pay $7589 on average for full automation. More
(2018) experienced licensed drivers and older people were associated with lower WTP
values for AV technologies

Liu et al. (in press-b) 441 Chinese; offline survey Social trust (e.g., trust in automakers) had a direct effect as well as an indirect
effect on participants’ WTP for SDV technology on their next car; perceived
benefit and perceived risk were significant predictors of WTP; 30.8% of
participants were unwilling to pay for this technology

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levels (Bansal and Kockelman, 2017; Daziano et al., 2017; Kyriakidis et al., 2015; Payre et al., 2014; Schoettle and Sivak, 2014a).
Usually, people are willing to pay more for higher vehicle attention (see Table 1). Previous studies also reported the effects of
predisposing characteristics (e.g., age, income) on individuals’ WTP. Younger (Abraham et al., 2017), men (Bansal et al., 2016), and
higher-income respondents (Bansal et al., 2016) have been linked with higher WTP. These predisposing characteristics may endow
individuals with positive or negative affect (Kahan, 2009), which in turn shape risk and benefit perception and technology accep-
tance. For example, women participants had a lower willingness to use AVs than men participants because they anticipated higher
anxiety from riding in an AV (Hohenberger et al., 2016).

2.2. Research objectives

Our literature review uncovered several points that merit attention:

• As shown in Table 1, WTP differs by country and most surveys were conducted in the U.S. Research conducted in other countries,
(e.g., China, one of the largest vehicle markets), will provide a more complete picture of WTP.
• WTP research to date remains focused on demographic variables. Investigating the influence of demographic factors offers
practical insights for market segmentation. Certain demographic factors (e.g., gender, age, education) have been found to be
influential in forming WTP (see Section 2.3.1), but legitimate questions arise. For example, are the influences of these demo-
graphic factors on WTP robust? Are they still detectable after controlling for the parallel influence of psychological factors on
WTP?
• Understanding public sentiment toward any emerging technology is pivotal because, historically, public perceptions, responses
and attitudes have shaped the direction and pace of technological development. Psychological responses to SDV technology may
influence individuals’ WTP; however, these influences were almost ignored in the past literature, according to our observation.
They may explain why a large proportion of people are unwilling to pay extra for it. Unearthing the cognitive and affective drivers
of WTP can offer practical insights for increasing WTP and other types of technology acceptance.

Based on surveys in two Chinese cities, we probe WTP and its potential demographic and psychological determinants. We con-
sider five demographic factors (familiarity, gender, age, income, and education), as they seem to have, more or less, clear re-
lationships with WTP. Drawing on theories of risk perception and trust, we also consider the influences of four psychological factors:
perceived benefit and risk of SDVs, anticipated perceived dread caused by riding in SDVs, and trust in SDVs. The importance of
perceived benefit and risk to WTP has been previously investigated (Liu et al., in press-b), and the contribution of perceived dread
and trust to WTP was overlooked in the context of AVs. Next we explore the relationships between WTP and these nine demographic
and psychological factors and submit hypotheses for testing.

2.3. Hypotheses development

2.3.1. Demographic factors and WTP

The “familiarity hypothesis” in psychology argues that support for an emerging technology will likely grow as awareness of it
expands (Cobb and Macoubrie, 2004; Kahan et al., 2008; Satterfield et al., 2009). In the AV literature, Ward et al. (2017) reported the
positive influence of self-reported knowledge on participants’ interest in using an AV and likelihood of buying an AV; Bansal and
Kockelman (2018) found that, although those who had heard about Google self-driving cars tended to express a higher WTP for SDVs
than those who had not, the difference was not significant. Here we operationalize familiarity as whether or not participants had
heard about SDVs before the survey. In line with the “familiarity hypothesis”, we submit:

H1: Those who have heard of SDVs report a higher WTP for adding SDV technology to their next car.

Gender differences in beliefs and attitudes about risk have been noted in risk perception research (Gustafson, 1998; Slovic, 1999).
Usually, women hold less positive attitudes toward emerging technologies and perceive higher risks from these technologies than
men. This difference is weak but systematic. Women are reported to be less willing to use AV technology (Hohenberger et al., 2016)
and pay for adding partial and full automation to their next vehicle (Bansal et al., 2016). We submit the following hypothesis:

H2: Women report a lower WTP for adding SDV technology to their next car.

Older adults expect to benefit the most from self-driving technology in terms of mobility. However, their potential physical and
cognitive limitations might make using the new technology a challenge for them. Usually, younger people are more likely to desire in-
vehicle technologies and options (Owens et al., 2015), and express more interested in full automation and more willingness to pay for
it (Abraham et al., 2017; Bansal and Kockelman, 2018; Bansal et al., 2016). Thus, we submit the following hypothesis:

H3: Age negatively affects WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.

The positive relationship between income and WTP is intuitive. People with higher income may have more money available to
purchase SDV technology when available and may therefore adopt the technology earlier than others. In fact, this positive

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relationship has been confirmed in past surveys (Bansal et al., 2016; Kyriakidis et al., 2015). Thus, we make the hypothesis:

H4: Income positively affects WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.

Education may affect people’s perception and preference regarding SDV technology. Kyriakidis et al. (2015) showed that edu-
cation was positively correlated with respondents’ WTP for SDV technology. In this study, we submit:

H5: Education positively affects WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.

2.3.2. Psychological factors and WTP

Perception is critical since human behavior is derivative of what we think or perceive. People pursue a choice when they perceive
low costs, risks, or efforts and high benefits from this choice (Zheng et al., 2014). People weigh benefit and risk beliefs about a
technology or policy through cognitive processes that inform their decisions to accept or reject it. The contribution of benefit and risk
beliefs to acceptance of a technology or policy is formalized in certain social and psychological theories such as the value-belief-norm
theory (Stern, 2000), the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1991), and the trust heuristic (Siegrist, 1999). Perceived benefit was
found to positively influence willingness to use AVs (Hohenberger et al., 2017) and intention to use SDVs (Choi and Ji, 2015). Liu
et al. (in press-b) reported significant influences of perceived benefit and perceived risk on general acceptance and WTP associated
with SDVs. If people perceive more benefit and less risk from SDVs, they may be willing to pay more for this technology. We submit:

H6: Perceived benefit positively influences WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.
H7: Perceived risk negatively influences WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.

As suggested by the affect heuristic (Finucane et al., 2000) and the risk-as-feeling hypothesis (Loewenstein et al., 2001) in
psychology, people would rely on their affects, emotions, and feelings to directly make judgments about whether to accept or reject a
technology. Higher positive affect (e.g., happy, satisfaction) and lower negative affect (e.g., fear, worry) evoked by a technology are
usually predictors of higher technology acceptance. The contribution of affect to AV acceptance is increasingly recognized (Dixon
et al., in press; Hohenberger et al., 2016; Winter et al., 2018). For instance, Hohenberger et al. (2016) found that women had higher
anxiety and lower pleasure toward AVs than men and thus they had less willingness to use AVs. The impact of positive and negative
affects toward SDVs on WTP was not yet investigated. We investigate the anticipated perceived dread (e.g., feeling frightened,
worried, and restless) about riding in an SDV. We assume that:

H8: Perceived dread negatively influences WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.

Researchers have noted the central role of trust in human-automation interactions and have demonstrated the impact of trust on
acceptance, utilization, and reliance behaviors (Lee and See, 2004; Parasuraman and Riley, 1997). Trust in a technology might create
willingness to accept and use the technology (Lee and See, 2004). Trust is a key determinant of intention to use AVs (Choi and Ji,
2015; Ward et al., 2017; Xu et al., 2018) and of reliance on an automated driving system (Körber et al., 2018). The role of trust in
forming WTP for SDVs is largely ignored by previous studies. We posit that:

H9: Trust in SDVs positively influences WTP for adding SDV technology to the next car.

3. Methodology

3.1. Participants

We had two surveys in Tianjin City and Xi’an City, China. In Tianjin City, participants in recreational areas were approached by
interviewers; 611 participants completed the questionnaire, among which 25 participants (4.1%) were eliminated because 20 pro-
vided a neutral response to most psychological items, one missed the WTP question, and four participants missed specific demo-
graphic information. As shown in Table 2, the sample in Tianjin was not very representative and skewed toward younger and more
highly educated people.
To conquer this limitation, we conducted a similar survey with a larger, more representative sample.1 In the survey in Xi’an, 800
participants completed the questionnaire, among which 31 (3.9%) were eliminated because 18 provided same responses to most
psychological items, one missed the WTP question, five missed one psychological item, and seven missed specific demographic
information. According to a census in Xi’an City in 2010,2 28.4% of its population aged between 20 and 29, 20.2% aged between 30
and 39, 20.7% aged between 40 and 49, 16.0% aged between 50 and 59, and 14.8% aged equal to or higher than 60. In the sample of
this city, 26.8% aged between 21 and 29, 17.7% aged between 30 and 39, 17.8% aged between 40 and 49, 13.4% aged between 50
and 59, and 12.9% aged equal to or higher than 60. Thus, the sample in Xi’an City is representative in terms of population age. We do

1
We thank reviewers for suggesting this fullow-up survey.
2
Source: https://www.citypopulation.de/php/china-admin_c.php?adm2id=6101.

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Table 2
Demographic information of participants (N = 1355) in Tianjin City (n = 586) and Xi’an City (n = 769).
Variable Response Tianjin City Xi'an City Two cities

Heard of SDVs Yes 494 (84.3%) 641 (83.5%) 1135 (83.8%)

No 92 (15.7%) 127 (16.5%) 219 (16.2%)

Gender Women 263 (44.9%) 388 (50.5%) 651 (48.0%)

Men 323 (55.1%) 381 (49.5%) 704 (52.0%)

Age ≤20 41 (7.0%) 88 (11.4%) 129 (9.5%)

21–29 291 (49.7%) 206 (26.8%) 497 (36.7%)
30–39 160 (27.3%) 136 (17.7%) 296 (21.8%)
40–49 61 (10.4%) 137 (17.8%) 198 (14.6%)
50–59 22 (3.8%) 103 (13.4%) 125 (9.2%)
≥60 11 (1.9%) 99 (12.9%) 110 (8.1%)

Education Middle school and below 26 (4.4%) 61 (7.9%) 87 (6.4%)

High school 107 (18.3%) 158 (20.6%) 265 (19.6%)
Junior college 111 (18.9%) 163 (21.2%) 274 (20.2%)
Undergraduate 282 (48.1%) 319 (41.5%) 601 (44.4%)
Graduate 60 (10.2%) 67 (8.7%) 127 (9.4%)

Occupation Company employee 204 (34.8%) 257 (33.4%) 461 (34.0%)

Civil servants 34 (5.8%) 32 (4.2%) 66 (4.9%)
Public sector employees 106 (18.1%) 118 (15.3%) 224 (16.5%)
Self-employed 67 (11.4%) 82 (10.7%) 149 (11.0%)
Retired 9 (1.5%) 77 (10.0%) 86 (6.3%)
Students 110 (18.8%) 89 (11.6%) 199 (14.7%)
Others 56 (9.6%) 114 (14.8%) 170 (12.5%)

Monthly income (CNY) 1000–3000 144 (24.6%) 182 (23.7%) 326 (24.1%)
3000–5000 191 (32.6%) 237 (30.8%) 428 (31.6%)
5000–7000 132 (22.5%) 155 (20.2%) 287 (21.2%)
7000–10,000 75 (12.8%) 102 (13.3%) 177 (13.1%)
10,000–20,000 32 (5.5%) 70 (9.1%) 102 (7.5%)
> 20,000 12 (2.0%) 23 (3.0%) 35 (2.6%)

Driving license holder Yes 388 (66.2%) 505 (65.7%) 893 (65.9%)
No 198 (33.8%) 264 (34.3%) 462 (34.1%)

CNY, China Yuan. 1 CNY ≈ 0.145 USD.

not find more information from this census to check whether our sample is representative in terms of other demographic factors.

3.2. Procedure

After agreed to complete the survey, participants were instructed to read a short description and graphic scenario of SDVs on the
cover page, respond to a series of items about SDVs (see Section 3.3), and provide their demographic information. To reduce response
bias when participants were unfamiliar with this technology, we presented them with a verbal description of SDVs (Kyriakidis et al.,
2015) and a graphic scenario of SDVs (Diels and Bos, 2016) for illustrating their potential applications and utility (cf. Liu et al., in
press-b). A difference between the two surveys was that participants reported their age matching one of the age categories as shown
in Table 2 in Tianjin City and reported their exact age in Xi’an City.

3.3. Measure design

The items for perceived benefit (PB), perceived risk (PR), perceived dread (PD), and trust in SDVs were assessed on five-point
Likert-type scales (1 = totally disagree, 5 = totally agree) and are presented in Table 3. To measure participants’ WTP for SDV tech-
nology, a contingent valuation method (CVM) was used: Participants were asked the question: “Assuming you will buy a new vehicle,
how much extra money would you be willing to pay to purchase a fully self-driving technology installed in your next vehicle?” This question
was adopted from a previous study (Kyriakidis et al., 2015). A total of 12 alternatives were provided, from “0 CNY” to “ > 200,000
CNY” (see Fig. 1).

3.4. Data analysis

We can refer to the WTP question in our study as an attitudinal willingness to pay question (Kahneman and Ritov, 1994;
Montgomery and Helvoigt, 2006), and then we can assign the numeric values of 0–11 to its 12 alternatives for statistical analysis,
following previous studies (Kyriakidis et al., 2015; Liu et al., in press-b).
Three methods were adopted for regression analysis. Partial least squares (PLS), a component-based structural equation modeling
(SEM), was applied with 5000 resamples through the R package ‘plspm’ (version: 0.4.7) (Sanchez, 2013). A Tobit model (Tobin,

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Table 3
Constructs, their items, and sources.
Constructs Items Sources

Perceived benefit (PB) SDVs can reduce traffic crashes (PB1) from Liu et al. (in press-b); benefit items were from Anderson et al. (2016),
SDVs can reduce traffic congestion (PB2) Bansal et al. (2016), Fagnant and Kockelman (2015), Howard and Dai (2014)
SDVs can reduce vehicle emissions and pollution
(PB3)
SDVs can improve fuel economy (PB4)
SDVs can reduce transport cost (PB5)
SDVs can increase mobility for those who are
currently incapable of driving (PB6)

Perceived risk (PR) I am concerned about equipment and system from Liu et al. (in press-b); risk concern items were from Anderson et al. (2016),
failures in SDVs (PR1) Bansal et al. (2016), Fagnant and Kockelman (2015)
I am concerned about the legal liability of drivers or
owners of SDVs (PR2)
I am concerned that the computer systems of SDVs
are hacked (PR3)
I am concerned about SDVs travelers’ privacy
disclosure (PR4)
I am concerned about SDVs sharing roads with
conventional vehicles (PR5)
I am concerned that SDVs cannot endure various
weather conditions and terrains (PR6)
I am concerned that SDVs are too expensive (PR7)
I am concerned about losing the fun in driving
while riding in an SDV (PR8)

Perceived dread (PD) I will feel frightened if I ride in an SDV (PD1) Modified from Terpstra (2011)
I will feel worried if I ride in an SDV (PD2)
I will feel restless if I ride in an SDV (PD3)

Trust in SDVs SDV is dependable (TR1) Modified from Choi and Ji (2015)
SDV is reliable (TR2)
Overall, I can trust SDV (TR3)

CNY USD Tianjin Xi'an

> 200,000 > 29,000 2.9% 2.3%
100,000–200,000 14,500–29,000 6.8% 4.4%
80,000–100,000 11,600–14,500 3.8% 4.9%
60,000–80,000 8,700–11,600 1.7% 1.3%
50,000–60,000 7,250–8,700 3.9% 2.5%
40,000–50,000 5,800–7,250 5.6% 5.2%
30,000–40,000 4,350–5,800 4.3% 4.0%
20,000–30,000 2,900–4,350 7.0% 8.3%
10,000–20,000 1,450–2,900 15.9% 16.4%
5,000–10,000 725–1,450 14.2% 12.6%
< 5,000 < 725 8.2% 11.2%
0 0 25.8% 26.8%
0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%
Fig. 1. Participants’ WTP for SDV technology (1 CNY ≈ 0.145 USD).

1958) was employeed to address the left-censored data in our study (i.e., a big proportion of participants’ WTP being 0), through the
R package ‘AER’ (version: 1.2-4) (Kleiber and Zeileis, 2008). Ordinary least squares (OLS) analysis was adopted to provide a baseline
estimate for relevant parameters. Utilizing different regression methods is beneficial to check the robustness of regression results.

4. Results

4.1. Reliability and validity of the measure design

We first checked the reliability and validity of the measurement model for the four psychological factors through PLS-SEM. Initial
factor analysis showed that PB6, PR7 and PR8 items had low item loadings (< 0.65) and thus they were eliminated from the final
measures. All item loadings except one item were greater than 0.70, and the loading for the exception was 0.69, supporting indicator

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Table 4
Results of reliability and validity (total N = 1355).
Construct Items M (SD) Loadings α CR AVE

Perceived benefit PB1 3.25 (0.95) 0.78 0.81 0.87 0.57

PB2 3.27 (1.02) 0.79
PB3 3.25 (0.98) 0.72
PB4 3.46 (0.91) 0.74
PB5 3.35 (0.96) 0.73

Perceived risk PR1 3.74 (0.90) 0.77 0.83 0.88 0.54

PR2 3.72 (0.89) 0.75
PR3 3.75 (0.90) 0.70
PR4 3.62 (0.95) 0.69
PR5 3.56 (0.93) 0.72
PR6 3.56 (0.97) 0.77

Perceived dread PD1 3.26 (0.98) 0.92 0.93 0.95 0.87

PD2 3.31 (0.96) 0.94
PD3 3.30 (0.98) 0.94

Trust in SDVs TR1 3.21 (0.84) 0.90 0.88 0.93 0.81

TR2 3.18 (0.83) 0.92
TR3 3.16 (0.87) 0.88

M, mean; SD, standard deviation; α, Cronbach’s alpha; CR, composite reliability; AVE, average variance extracted.

reliability (see Table 4). Cronbach’s α and composite reliability (CR) values were above 0.80, supporting internal consistency (Hair
et al., 2014). Average variance extracted (AVE) values were greater than the cutoff criterion of 0.50 (Hair et al., 2014), confirming
convergent validity. The square root of each AVE value (shown on the diagonal in Table 5) was greater than the associated inter-
construct correlation (shown off the diagonal in Table 5), supporting discriminant validity (Hair et al., 2014). All variance inflation
factor (VIF) values were below 2.00 and thus did not indicate serious multicollinearity problems (Hair et al., 2014). To examine
common method variance (CMV), we run a Harman’s single-factor test by loading all items into an exploratory factor analysis without
a rotation (Podsakoff et al., 2003). The single factor accounted for 29% of total variance, less than 50%; thus, the CMV issue was not
problematic. Therefore, the reliability and validity of the measurement model for psychological factors were acceptable.

4.2. Basic statistics

Participants in the two cities did not report different WTP (χ2(11, N = 1355) = 12.3, p = .339). As shown in Fig. 1, participants can
be roughly classified into three groups: participants were unwilling to pay for extra for SDVs (25.8% in Tianjin and 26.8% in Xi’an;
26.3% in the two cities), willing to pay for less than 2900 USD (38.2% in Tianjin and 40.2% in Xi’an; 39.3% in the two cities), and
willing to pay for more than 2900 USD (36.0% in Tianjin and 33.0% in Xi’an; 34.3% in the two cities).

Table 5
M and SD of variables, and zero-order correlation between variables.
Variable M (SD) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

a
1. Heard of SDVs 0.84 (0.37)
2. Genderb 0.48 (0.50) −0.07
3. Agec 2.02 (1.41) −0.15 0.01
4. Educationd 2.31 (1.09) 0.22 0.01 −0.43
5. Occupatione 0.21 (0.41) 0.05 −0.03 0.03 0.17
6. Month incomef 1.56 (1.32) 0.15 −0.16 0.11 0.26 0.18
7. Driverg 0.66 (0.47) 0.17 −0.26 −0.07 0.25 0.16 0.36
8. PB 3.32 (0.73) 0.14 −0.10 0.00 0.05 0.06 0.05 0.07 (0.75)
9. PR 3.66 (0.68) −0.05 0.01 −0.11 0.08 0.00 −0.02 0.03 0.00 (0.73)
10. PD 3.29 (0.91) −0.11 0.10 −0.03 −0.03 −0.02 −0.06 −0.02 −0.23 0.38 (0.93)
11. Trust 3.18 (0.76) 0.16 −0.05 0.02 0.09 0.06 0.09 0.04 0.51 −0.09 −0.37 (0.90)
12. WTPg 3.25 (3.22) 0.17 −0.09 −0.21 0.27 0.02 0.12 0.13 0.17 −0.08 −0.16 0.22

Bold denotes significance of less than 0.05 (two-tailed). Numbers in parentheses are the square roots of the AVEs. The off-diagonal elements are the
correlations between the constructs.
a
No = 0; yes = 1.
b
Man = 0; woman = 1.
c
≤20 = 0; 21–29 = 1; 30–39 = 2; 40–49 = 3; 50–59 = 4; ≥ 60 = 5.
d
Middle school and below = 0; high school = 1; junior college = 2; undergraduate = 3; graduate = 4.
e
Civil servants and public sector employees = 1; others = 0.
f
1000–3000 CNY = 0; 3000–5000 CNY = 1; 5000–7000 CNY = 2; 7000–10,000 CNY = 3; 10,000–20,000 CNY = 4; > 20,000 CNY = 5.
g
Not driving license holder = 0; driving license holder = 1.

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Table 6
Results of PLS-SEM analysis for psychological factors.
Predictorsa Perceived benefit Perceived risk Perceived dread Trust in SDVs

β t β t β t β t

Heard of SDVs .13*** 4.80 −.07* −2.51 −.11*** −3.92 .15*** 5.34
Gender −.11*** −3.76 .01 .30 .10*** 3.40 −.04 −1.34
Age .02 .81 −.10** −3.24 −.06 −1.93 .07* 2.18
Education .03 .99 .06 1.86 −.04 −1.19 .08* 2.43
Occupation .05 1.77 .00 .04 −.01 −.18 .03 1.08
Income −.01 −.29 −.02 −.71 −.03 −.87 .04 1.22
Driver .01 .25 .03 .87 .04 1.30 −.03 −.94

R2 0.037 0.022 0.026 0.038

β, standardized coefficients.
a
The coding of demographic factors refers to Table 5.
* p < .05.
** p < .01.
*** p < .001.

Analyses of covariance tests were conducted with the four psychological factors as the dependent variables, city as the in-
dependent variable (Tianjin = 0, Xi’an = 1), and the demographic factors in Table 2 as the covariates. Participants from these two
cities did not differ in PB (B = 0.04, F(1,1346) = 0.75, p = .388) and PR (B = −0.02, F(1,1346) = 0.18, p = .671). Differences in PD
(B = −0.15, F(1,1346) = 8.73, p = .003) and trust (B = 0.09, F(1,1346) = 4.63, p = .032) were significant but small in magnitude. In
the following analysis, data from the two cities were merged.

4.3. Regression analysis on the four psychological factors

Both PLS-EM and OLS models were run to examine the demographic predictors of the four psychological factors. As these two
models yielded similar results, only PLS-SEM results are reported in Table 6. Those who had heard of SDVs reported higher perceived
benefit (β = 0.13, p < .001) and trust in SDVs (β = 0.15, p < .001) and lower perceived dread (β = −0.11, p < .001) and per-
ceived risk (β = −0.07, p = .012) than those who had not. Women participants reported lower perceived benefit (β = −0.11,
p < .001) and higher perceived dread (β = 0.10, p < .001) than men participants. Age was a negative predictor of perceived risk
(β = −0.10, p = .001) and a positive predictor of trust in SDVs (β = 0.07, p = .030). Other demographic factors did not contribute to
explaining the psychological factors.

Table 7
Results of regression analysis for WTP.
Predictorsa PLS-SEM model Tobit model OLS model

β t B Z β t

Heard of SDVs .05* 1.97 .75* 2.39 .05* 2.01

Gender −.05 −1.83 −.41 −1.85 −.05 −1.86
Age −.14*** −4.83 −.53*** −5.98 −.14*** −4.84
Education .17*** 5.41 .62*** 5.25 .17*** 5.44
Occupation −.03 −1.22 −.26 −1.00 −.03 −1.21
Income .06* 2.01 .19* 2.07 .06* 2.01
Driver .03 1.02 .30 1.17 .03 .99
PB .07* 2.40 .54** 3.11 .07* 2.26
PR −.07** −2.59 −.53** −3.09 −.07** −2.60
PD −.06* −1.93 −.34* −2.45 −.06* −1.97
Trust .12*** 3.99 .93*** 5.42 .13*** 4.09

R2 0.151 0.150
Log likelihood −3023
Pseudo R2 0.045

β, standardized coefficients; B, unstandardized coefficients.

a
The coding of demographic factors refers to Table 5.
* p < .05.
** p < .01.
*** p < .001.

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4.4. Regression analysis on WTP

As shown in Table 7, the three methods reported convergent results on the significant demographic and psychological predictors
of WTP. Results from the PLS-SEM model are reported here. Those who had heard of SDVs reported higher WTP for adding SDV
technology in their next vehicle (β = 0.05, p = .049). Education (β = 0.17, p < .001) and income (β = 0.06, p = .045) were two
positive predictors of WTP. Age negatively predicted WTP (β = − 0.14, p < .001). Gender added little value to explain WTP
(β = −0.05, p = .067), although it was correlated with WTP (r = −0.07, p = .007). Thus, H1, H3, H4 and H5 were supported, and
H2 was rejected.
As expected, perceived benefit (β = 0.07, p = .017) and trust in SDVs (β = 0.12, p < .001) were two positive predictors of WTP;
perceived risk (β = − 0.07, p = .009) and perceived dread (β = − 0.06, p = .050) were two negative predictors of WTP. Thus, H6,
H7, H8, and H9 were supported.
The proportion of explained variance (R2) value for WTP was 0.151 in the PLS-SEM model and 0.150 in the OLS model, larger
than the cutoff value of 0.10 (Falk and Miller, 1992), suggesting acceptable explanatory power for WTP. Nevertheless, the R2 value
for WTP was relatively low, probably because WTP was measured by a CVM method that is different from the Likert scales for the
four psychological predictors.

5. Discussion and conclusions

About 26.3% of Chinese participants from two cities were unwilling to pay extra for SDV technology, 39.3% were willing to pay
less than 2900 USD (20,000 CNY), and 34.3% were willing to pay more than 2900 USD. Familiarity, age, education, and income were
significant predictors of WTP after controlling for psychological factors, indicating their consistent effects on WTP. As expected,
perceived benefit and trust were two positive predictors of WTP and perceived risk and perceived dread were two negative predictors
of WTP.

5.1. Are people willing to pay extra for SDV technology?

A conflicting result emerged on the question of whether people are willing to pay extra. Kyriakidis et al. (2015), Liu et al. (in
press-b), and the current study demonstrated that a moderate percentage of people are unwilling to pay more for SDV technology
(22%, 30.8% and 26.3%, respectively). In contrast, other studies (Bansal and Kockelman, 2017; Schoettle and Sivak, 2014b) have
reported that the majority of participants (> 50%) were unwilling to pay. Between-country differences might account for this
conflicting result to a certain degree, as demonstrated in Schoettle and Sivak’s cross-national survey (2014a), where the majority of
participants (> 70%) from two developing countries (China and India) were willing to pay, whereas the majority of participants
(> 50%) from four developed countries (US, UK, Australia, Japan) were unwilling to pay. Previous surveys (Liu et al., in press-b;
Schoettle and Sivak, 2014a) and ours reported similar results on the percentage of Chinese participants unwilling to pay. According to
a cross-cultural perspective (Weber and Hsee, 1998), one potential account for the difference in the percentage of people unwilling to
pay between US and China may be that compared to American participants, Chinese participants were more risk-seeking and more
willing to pay for risky options.

5.2. Demographic factors and WTP

Recent studies reported that familiarity did not predict WTP for SDVs (Bansal and Kockelman, 2018) or lost its ability to explain
public supports for SDVs after controlling for psychological factors (Dixon et al., in press). We observed the persistent influence of
familiarity on WTP, however. It was the only predisposing factor associated with all of the psychological factors. Those who had
heard about SDVs expressed higher WTP for the technology, placed higher trust in the technology, perceived higher benefits, lower
risks and lower dread, than those who had not. These findings evoke the familiarity hypothesis, which argues that higher levels of
familiarity form more positive attitudes. Similar findings on the influence of familiarity can be found in studies on other technologies
(Cobb and Macoubrie, 2004; Satterfield et al., 2009).
As reported before (Kyriakidis et al., 2015), gender was (weakly but significantly) correlated with WTP; however, it lost its power
to explain WTP in our regression analysis. Gender differences in WTP for adding SDVs (Bansal et al., 2016) and the acceptable risk of
SDVs (Liu et al., in press-a) were not observed before. Regarding the psychological factors, we indeed found gender differences in
perceived benefit and perceived dread, but not in perceived risk and trust. “Gender difference” in psychology and behavioral science
suggests that, compared to men, women express more concern and worry for the same risks, perceive risks as more serious, and take
fewer risks (Gustafson, 1998; Slovic, 1999). These gender differences are seldom very large, but appear to be systematic. In our study,
women felt higher dread than men when thinking about riding in an SDV, but they did not express higher risk concerns; thus, these
results are, in part, still in line with the long-standing findings on gender differences in psychology and behavioral science research.
Although Kyriakidis et al. (2015) found a non-significant correlation between age and WTP, age was found to be a consistent
predictor of WTP after controlling for psychological factors. Higher age decreased participants’ WTP for SDV technology, which is
consistent with findings from other studies (Abraham et al., 2017; Bansal and Kockelman, 2018; Bansal et al., 2016). Bansal et al.
(2016) explained that perhaps older people are more concerned about learning to use SDVs and do not trust the technology. However,
trust in SDVs increased with age in our study; thus, Bansal et al.’s explanation is not supported by our findings.
People with higher income were expected to offer more for SDV technology. Previous studies (Bansal and Kockelman, 2018;

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Bansal et al., 2016; Kyriakidis et al., 2015) have demonstrated a positive relationship between income and WTP. In line with these
observations, income was a positive predictor of WTP. Note that this observation seems to be inconsistent with other studies where
income was not correlated with general acceptance of SDVs (Nordhoff et al., 2018b) or intention to use SDVs (Becker and Axhausen,
2017; Zmud and Sener, 2017).
Fewer studies have addressed the effect of education on WTP compared to other demographic factors. Kyriakidis et al. (2015)
reported that education was positively correlated with WTP for AVs. Our results confirmed the robustness of education’s positive
effect on WTP. Regarding other indicators of public acceptance, a survey (Zmud and Sener, 2017), however, indicated that education
was not associated with intention to use AVs.

5.3. Psychological factors and WTP

Benefit and risk beliefs associated with a technology or policy determine its acceptability (Bronfman and Vázquez, 2011; Siegrist,
1999). Perceived benefit (Choi and Ji, 2015; Dixon et al., in press; Hohenberger et al., 2017; Liu et al., in press-b) and perceived risk
(Dixon et al., in press; Liu et al., in press-b; Ward et al., 2017) was meaningful predictors of public acceptance of and willingness to
use this technology. However, the contribution of these beliefs to WTP was less investigated (Liu et al., in press-b). In line with
previous findings on other types of technology acceptance, these two beliefs were significant predictors of WTP in our study.
The importance of affect in judgment and decision-making has been clearly discussed (Finucane et al., 2000; Loewenstein et al.,
2001). Previous studies (Hohenberger et al., 2016, 2017; Winter et al., 2018) suggest the importance of affective ratings associated
with AVs in acceptance formation. We for the first time witnessed perceived dread as a negative predictor of WTP, suggesting that if
people feel higher dread about riding in an SDV, they would be less willing to pay extra for the technology.
Sufficient trust is regarded as a necessary precondition for mass adoption of AVs (Noy et al., 2018; Shariff et al., 2017). If people
do not have a sufficient confidence in AVs, then they cannot accrue benefits from them. Past studies demonstrated the positive
relationship of trust with intention to use AVs (Abraham et al., 2017; Choi and Ji, 2015; Ward et al., 2017) and with reliance on
automated driving systems (Körber et al., 2018). To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to reveal the significant contribution of
trust in SDVs to WTP.

5.4. Practical implications

This study offers certain practical implications. First, its results might provide insights for assessing the value of this technology in
the vehicle market (e.g., the Chinese vehicle market). Second, our findings provide useful insights for assessing the role of psy-
chological and demographic factors in segmenting the AV market and sketching the profile of potential adopters (e.g., those who
know about SDVs and are highly educated). Third, we identified the psychological factors that explain WTP. Insufficient trust has
been thought to be one of the major psychological barriers to wide adoption of SDVs (Hutson, 2017; Shariff et al., 2017). Our
participants had a “neutral” response to trust in SDVs. Building public trust through promotional campaigns and/or vehicle design is
essential. For example, SDVs should be designed with high reliability, usability, and understandability (Hengstler et al., 2016). Public
communication should be open and proactive, providing concrete and tangible information about the technology. Our participants
had a near “neutral” response to perceived benefit. Policymakers and automakers should address the surveyed benefits of SDVs (e.g.,
items from PB1 and PB3, described in Table 3) and reduce participants’ risk beliefs related to SDVs to increase people’s WTP. They
also need to decrease the public’s perceived dread related to SDVs and promote the positive images of SDVs through social media
tools (e.g., internet and TV) and tests of their functions and operations in fields or on public roads.

5.5. Limitations and further research

First, our participants were from two cities in China, and thus, generalizing our results should be cautioned. Given between-
country differences that emerged for WTP (Schoettle and Sivak, 2014a), there could be between-country differences in the demo-
graphic and psychological factors influencing WTP. Second, our participants, although informed about SDVs and their potential
applications and utility, did not have direct experience of a vehicle in the self-driving mode, which could prevent them from building
an appropriate mental model about SDVs (Körber et al., 2018) and from reaching reasoned beliefs and perceptions about SDVs (Xu
et al., 2018), which could bias their stated WTP. Third, the adoption of these regression methods might be criticized from a mea-
surement perspective, although they are widely adopted in similar situations in social science research. Fourth, the design of the
current surveys does not permit confident inferences about CVM, because the SDV technology does not have a market yet and our
participants did not have direct experience of this technology. It is uncertain, in the context of SDVs, whether the stated WTP reflects
the true WTP.
Certain avenues of research are suggested here. First, replicating our surveys in countries can provide valuable information for
global deployment of SDVs. Second, future studies can have participants with direct experience of self-driving. Direct experience is
expected to facilitate people to make more reasoned decisions on their WTP. Third, further research can consider the role of an-
ticipated positive affect evoked by SDV technology. Fourth, further research is needed to understand the barriers to high WTP and
underlying reasons for cross-cultural differences in WTP. Finally, further research can consider why and how certain demographic
factors (e.g., gender, age) affect WTP for the technology.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported in part by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2018YFB0105100) and
the Seed Foundation of Tianjin University, China (No. 2018XRG-0026).

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