Consumer Perceptions Rising That Self-Driving Cars Are Unsafe, Cox Automotive Survey Finds

Consumer awareness of autonomous driving is on the rise, but so is the public's perception that it’s unsafe, a Cox Automotive study found. Cox canvassed 1,250 adults online in May and found 84 percent said they would be willing to ride in a self-driving vehicle, as long as they were given the option of taking control of the wheel, compared with only 16 percent who said they would feel comfortable riding without that option, it said Thursday. The proportion of respondents who said they think the roadways would be safer if all vehicles were fully autonomous decreased by 18 percentage points in the past two years, said Cox. Nearly half (49 percent) of those canvassed also now say they will “never” consider buying a vehicle with full Level 5 autonomy on the Society of Automotive Engineers scale, compared with 30 percent who expressed that sentiment two years ago, it said. “Recent high-profile accidents involving autonomous vehicles have cast a shadow on driverless appeal and software, but the accidents may only be slightly to blame for a change in consumer sentiment,” said Cox. Three-fourths of the survey respondents said they think fully autonomous vehicles need “real world testing to be perfected,” but more than half (54 percent) said they would prefer that testing take place far from where they live, it said. Consumers generally hold semi-autonomous vehicle-safety features in high esteem, it said. The survey found that more than half (54 percent) said they agree that features like collision-warning alert systems can make people become better, safer drivers, it said.