Why Do People Use New Mobility Services? A Behavioral Study
An innovative study of what motivates us to try new mobility services.
Highlights:
- New mobility services and modes have proliferated rapidly across cities and are changing how we move.
- But what motivates us to try new services like electric scooters or use ride-hailing apps, rather than taking a car — and could these motivating factors be used to help persuade drivers to opt for new mobility for shorter trips?
- To better understand the motivating factors behind new mobility choices, NUMO has partnered with University of California, Davis, and University of Leeds to conduct a behavioral research study.
Over the last decade, new mobility services and modes have proliferated across the urban landscape of our cities. We know that the number of users is steadily gaining each year, but we do not yet know what motivates people to try an e-scooter or use a ride-hailing app.
Years of research has made plain why people choose to use cars over other modes, with reasons ranging from convenience to perceived marginal cost to personal safety. But that research does not yet exist for new mobility. To better understand those motivating factors and how they might be leveraged to target interventions that reduce automobile ownership and car trips for shared modes, NUMO has partnered with University of California, Davis, and University of Leeds to undertake an innovative behavioral research study, as well as with Bird, Spin and Tier, micromobility operators who are facilitating survey distribution and data collection.
The study will use data collected through a survey of users of private new mobility operators — starting with e-scooters and coupled with actual trip data. The survey is designed to gather demographics and behaviors of e-scooter users to generate insights into why people try new modes, with the goal of leveraging these insights to motivate people to choose more sustainable modes of transportation over their cars.
Header image: City of St. Petersburg / Flickr
