**Abstract**

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) or automated driving systems (ADSs) are projected to be widely available in the coming years. Prior research has documented the reasoned benefits and concerns about this prospect, especially from the perspectives of mobility and safety. However, little work has focused on the prospect of using AVs to enhance children's mobility as well as the AV features that are needed for safety. An online survey was used to collect the opinions of parents within the United States on their willingness to use AVs to transport children. Results showed that parents' concerns, assurance-related car features, parents' technology readiness, child restraint system use (as a proxy for child age), and parent sex were important variables for modeling parents' willingness. These findings highlight potential users' needs and requirements as they consider AV ridership and use scenarios in the context of children's mobility. More research is critically needed to guide the development of AV features, safety evaluations, and regulatory policies, as child passengers are likely part of AV ridership scenarios in the perceivable future.

**Keywords:** children's mobility, children's safety, autonomous vehicle, ridership context, parents, vulnerable road users

## **1. Introduction**

Parenting in the digital contexts may involve utilizing digital devices and mechanisms in the caring of children and the supporting of child development. This chapter will discuss parenting in the era of automated (or autonomous, selfdriving) vehicles (AVs) and parents' perspective on using AVs to transport children and ridership scenarios.

US Department of Transportation has released its Vision 2.0, 3.0, and 4.0 on the future of transportation and the importance of safety in the deployment of motor vehicle driving automation systems [1–3]. These are vehicles that are capable of sensing their environment and performing dynamic driving tasks according to the level of automation equipped [4]. There are six levels of driving automation, ranging from no driving automation (level 0) to full driving automation (level 5), in the context of motor vehicles and their operation on roadways. Vehicles that are equipped with levels 3–5 of automation that can perform crash avoidance and complete dynamic

driving tasks are also colloquially referred to as automated or autonomous vehicles (AVs). Currently, most car companies design and manufacture their own versions of AVs, and optimists believe that AVs will be sufficiently reliable and affordable to replace conventional, human-driven vehicles by 2030 [5].

Undoubtedly, AVs are expected to shift the mobility practices, transit systems, and the infrastructure while impacting road users' everyday transportation needs. AV companies and government agencies project the benefits of AVs being enhanced safety, efficiency, convenience, and mobility. In fact, enhanced mobility is considered one of the major motivations for vehicle automation [6, 7]. Even though conventional vehicles can also achieve this purpose, AVs can improve mobility for those who cannot legally drive or do not drive due to age, disability, or incapacitation [1, 8–10]. Prior research on the impact of AV has indicated enhanced mobility (in the ranges of 10–40%) of underserved populations, such as adult non-drivers, the elderly without medical conditions, and adults with a travel restrictive medical condition [8, 11, 12], suggesting the potentials of AVs on improving independent mobility.

However, the above-mentioned studies focused on adults and senior populations and their transportation needs and did not include teenagers or younger children (age 16 and younger) in the analyses. Traditionally, children who have not reached the legal driving age depend on parents or older siblings for their mobility needs [13]. In addition, they are required by law to use a child restraint system (e.g., car seat, booster seat) or a vehicle seat belt during transit. AVs can potentially enhance and supplement mobility needs of young children and teenagers [8, 14], just like the projected positive impact of AVs on adult nondrivers; however, safety features and regulations of AVs, supporting infrastructure, legal requirements, and policies are still being discussed and developed [6, 15, 16]. Better understanding of AV ridership scenarios that involve children is critically needed.

To date, a few studies have examined the prospect of using AVs to enhance children's mobility. Participants were asked about the occasions they would like to use AVs in a 2015 study: 11% of participants indicated transporting children as a potential use, which was much lower than not using AVs at all (22%) [17]. In a 2017 study, 13 and 53% of participants were comfortable sending empty AVs to pick up children from school and get groceries, respectively [18]. Lee and Mirman in a 2018 study [19] investigated parents' perceived concerns and benefits about child occupants in AVs alone or with parents. Results indicated that parents could imagine the potential benefits (such as freeing up time from manual driving and potential carpool arrangements) but were concerned about losing active vehicle control. Mothers and parents with younger children had higher levels of concern and rated the benefits lower than their counterparts [19]. A 2019 study explored the minimum age for children riding in AVs alone, ridership scenarios, and vehicle features needed to support such uses [20]. Upon experiencing a short simulated autonomous ride, 63% of parents thought they would be willing to be alone or be with their child in an AV, but only 21% would let their child ride alone. Most study participants would let their children be alone in AVs when they reach age 16 [20]. A recent study showed that communication between children and parents during an autonomous school bus ride was important for both parties [21]. A 2020 study also found communication mechanisms (having a camera and microphone inside AVs) to be important [22].

There are two sources of potential concerns and hesitations in using AVs for children's mobility. One is in general related to concerns about driving automation systems and the lack of personal experience [23]. Some road users and drivers are ready to try new technologies, but others are not. AV-related accidents reported in the media [24] might also discourage potential users from buying AVs. Another

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*Parenting in the Digital Contexts: Are Parents Ready to Use Automated Vehicles to Transport…*

source is more directly related to parenting. When own children are involved, people become less comfortable, trusting, and willing to use automation or anything they are unfamiliar with, due to the primal instinct to protect own offspring [25] and family members [26]. Lack of knowledge and personal experience with AVs plus the parental instinct to care for own children may lead to mental barriers and decrease the willingness to explore AV use scenarios. More investigations are needed to better understand the sources of hesitations and how they can be lowered

Given the fast pace of AV-technology advancement and the large proportion of American adults wanting to have children or have had children [27], having child passengers in AVs would be a likely ridership scenario in the coming years. Therefore, this chapter was designed to address the lack of research on parenting in the age of AVs by examining factors that model parents' willingness to use AVs to transport children. The modeling framework was developed to answer these principal research questions: (1) What are the profiles of parents who are relatively higher and lower on willingness? (2) Which variables are important in differentiat-

Of note, this chapter is the secondary data analysis on an online survey study. A copy of the survey items can be found in [22]. The former analysis used a machine learning-based modeling approach, and the current analysis focused on a logistic

The survey was hosted on Qualtrics and distributed by Amazon Mechanical Turk. Verified Mechanical Turk workers who met the inclusion criteria (age 18 and older, being a parent or legal guardian, owning or leasing a vehicle, and residing within the US) were invited to participate and the compensation was 25 cents for each valid participation. Data were stored on Qualtrics and later downloaded for analysis. This research project received approval from the Institutional Review

Of the initial 1893 respondents, 287 were removed because they did not reside in the United States. An additional 296 respondents were further removed due to invalid responses to attention check questions. Some gave an incorrect answer when prompted to provide the current year, others reported that their age was a value outside the age range they had provided earlier. At the end of data cleaning, a total

The demographic questions in the survey included age group (9 year ranges starting from 18 to 64 with additional groups for under 18 and over 64), current age (compared against age group response for data validation purposes), sex at birth, primary residence (urban, suburban, rural, other), US state of residence, race and ethnicity, education level, and annual household income. Participants were also asked whether they were a parent or legal guardian of a child between the age of 0 and 14 years, and if so asked to provide demographics about one of the children (e.g., age, sex). This chosen child age range was to ensure that these parents and

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92753*

for the purpose of enhancing children's mobility.

ing high vs. low willingness?

regression approach.

**2.1 Data collection**

Board of the author's university.

of 1310 valid responses remained.

**2.2 Questionnaire development**

*2.2.1 Demographics of participants and their children*

**2. Method**

#### *Parenting in the Digital Contexts: Are Parents Ready to Use Automated Vehicles to Transport… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92753*

source is more directly related to parenting. When own children are involved, people become less comfortable, trusting, and willing to use automation or anything they are unfamiliar with, due to the primal instinct to protect own offspring [25] and family members [26]. Lack of knowledge and personal experience with AVs plus the parental instinct to care for own children may lead to mental barriers and decrease the willingness to explore AV use scenarios. More investigations are needed to better understand the sources of hesitations and how they can be lowered for the purpose of enhancing children's mobility.

Given the fast pace of AV-technology advancement and the large proportion of American adults wanting to have children or have had children [27], having child passengers in AVs would be a likely ridership scenario in the coming years. Therefore, this chapter was designed to address the lack of research on parenting in the age of AVs by examining factors that model parents' willingness to use AVs to transport children. The modeling framework was developed to answer these principal research questions: (1) What are the profiles of parents who are relatively higher and lower on willingness? (2) Which variables are important in differentiating high vs. low willingness?

Of note, this chapter is the secondary data analysis on an online survey study. A copy of the survey items can be found in [22]. The former analysis used a machine learning-based modeling approach, and the current analysis focused on a logistic regression approach.
