Early adopters of emergency braking and speed alert

We analyse the characteristics of early adopters of two intelligent vehicle safety systems, emergency braking and speed alert. Car users’ experiences with the two systems and the characteristics of early adopters of the systems were studied with an online survey organised in five European countries: Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, and Spain. All of the studied variables related to the user – gender, age, kilometres driven annually and monthly household income – had a statistically significant relationship with using emergency braking. Gender, kilometres driven annually and monthly household income had a statistically significant relationship with using speed alert. For both systems, male drivers were more likely to be the first users of the systems. In general, the share of users having experienced the systems also increased with annual kilometrage and monthly household income. Younger, 18- to 44-year-old drivers were found more likely to have used emergency braking than older, 65- to 74-year-old drivers. The results, however, suggest that respondents’ annual kilometrage and monthly household income may be more strongly associated with using the systems than with age.