Exploring the influence of anxiety, pleasure and subjective knowledge on public acceptance of fully autonomous vehicles

Although Fully Autonomous Vehicles (FAVs) will bring huge benefits to society, it seems that public acceptance tends to be mixed. This study, based on affective reactions and knowledge, develops a research framework to explain the general acceptance. The model also examines the mediating effects of perceived benefit/risk on the relationships between explanatory variables with general acceptance, to better comprehend consumers' psychological mechanism behind acceptance. Based on a survey of 1582 respondents, our study offers robust evidence that pleasure, anxiety, and subjective knowledge are surely the key factors in influencing consumers’ acceptance of FAVs. In addition, our findings reveal a significant mediation. Specifically, compared to perceived risk, perceived benefit manifested a greater mediation on the pleasure–general acceptance as well as subjective knowledge-general acceptance relationship. It is also emphasized that practitioners should improve emotional design and publicity strategies to improve users' perception of FAV benefits and thus improve acceptance.