SAE Consumer Autonomous Driving Study Finds… Public Acceptance?

With the realities of autonomous driving growing increasingly apparent, the Society of Automobile Engineers (SAE) decided to conduct a survey to gauge public sentiment surrounding the technology. We’ve seen these studies before, noticing a lack of consistency. While several high-profile accidents relating to autonomous (or semi-autonomous) systems have clearly shaken people’s confidence over the last two years, we’re still seeing conflicting reports — and we don’t mean minor discrepancies, either.

The SAE survey, published on Tuesday, stated that 76 percent of respondents “think a self-driving car experience is similar or superior to a human-driven experience.” However, the American Automobile Association (AAA) released a study in March claiming 71 percent of survey respondents still had serious concerns with the technology, with only 19 percent claiming they’d even consider putting a loved one in a self-driving vehicle.

That’s a complete turn-around in just over six months. Perhaps we should look at how these surveys are being conducted and the type of questions being asked, because taking the SAE Demo Days Survey at face value makes it seem as though automated driving has finally gained public acceptance.

From SAE:

SAE International today released the results of the SAE Demo Days Survey that found overwhelming public enthusiasm about self-driving cars. Based on data from nearly 1,400 participants at four SAE Demo Days events, 82 percent were initially enthusiastic for self-driving cars, with nearly 10 percent of participants reporting higher enthusiasm post-ride.

The SAE Demo Days Survey offers a unique perspective as it polled actual riders of a self-driving car and comes from SAE International, a trusted convener that provides a neutral forum for partners to advance mobility solutions. Through the SAE Demo Days program, the organization delivers an experience to help people gain awareness and hands-on understanding of self-driving cars as only six percent of participants had ridden in a self-driving car before taking part in an SAE Demo Days event.

Vagaries abound, but it seems SAE reported that only 10 percent of participants exited their self-driving journey feeling better about the experience — despite 82 percent going into the event pre-stoked on the technology — and then phrased it in a way that made it seem like a complete triumph. Fortunately, the veil was thin enough for us not to accuse SAE International of any unforgivable shenanigans. Still, it’s clearly hoping to sell everybody on the idea of autonomous driving.

“Public acceptance is vital to the future of self-driving cars. Through SAE Demo Days, we are engaging the public directly and inviting them to take a ride,” said Mark Chung, Chief Marketing Officer at SAE International, in a statement. “The demos foster informed decision-making while allowing SAE to capture insights from those who have taken a ride. The SAE Demo Days self-driving car experience spurred enthusiasm among nearly all of the riders and the experience overall is viewed by participants as comparable to or better than a human-driven experience.”

Engineers are hammers perpetually in search of a nail and autonomous driving is a railroad spike ten miles high. The challenges and opportunities here are too vast for them to ignore (these are the people that took us to the moon, after all). Perhaps we’re being too critical. We certainly didn’t subject AAA to the same level of scrutiny, but it also didn’t put up quite so many red flags.

The AAA study was also not focused primarily on the industry. While the SAE presented general acceptance findings in a release, the complete study actually goes into great detail about how its 1,400 respondents prefer their products. Do they want to buy AVs from legacy manufacturers or new market entrants? How much control are they willing to hand over to the car? When do they expect AVs to finally hit the consumer market? That’s the kind of stuff automakers would be interested in, and might help to explain SAE’s upbeat attitude.

Most of the results were mixed and not particularly revealing, however. Noteworthy exemptions included 76 percent of respondents indicating they wanted shared control with a vehicle — with 36 percent saying the car should have full control (i.e. actual autonomy) and 14 percent saying a human should always be in control. The majority (92 percent) also wanted there to be some kind of emergency stop feature implemented on all AVs. Only one percent of respondents said they had no interest in such a feature. On the subject of liability, 46 percent said self-driving mishaps should be deemed the fault of the manufacturer. Another 43 percent said owners and operators should be on the hook.

As for criticisms or fears relating to the technology, there was no such data. SAE doesn’t appear to have included any questions that might paint autonomy in a negative light. Safety was also spoken of often but rarely asked about. The closest we got in the survey was 37 percent of participants believing that the greatest benefit of self-driving cars will be their ability to reduce accidents and roadway fatalities. Though you could invert that and see it as 63 percent thinking safety might not be autonomous vehicles’ greatest strength.

[Images: SAE International]