An Introduction to a Psychoanalytic Framework for Passengers’ Experience in Autonomous Vehicles

Abstract

In this paper, we introduce a novel perspective for research concerning autonomous vehicles, by applying a psychoanalytic approach that focuses on capturing passengers’ emotional experience. By applying psychoanalytic thinking that aims at the sub-conscious parts of the experience, those that are often unobservable using common methodologies of studying discomfort, we expect to complement existing inquiries of discomfort in autonomous vehicles. The content for this paper’s examination was a set of video recordings, captured during an on-road, Wizard-of-Oz type study. In this study, participants were led to believe that they are being driven by a fully autonomous vehicle while their reactions, expressions and communication were monitored and recorded. In particular, we examined and categorized their emotional state of mind during various road situations. Using this data, we provide a theoretical framework and a formal representation of passengers’ emotional state of mind, and show how they can be used to capture and understand passengers’ emotional experience as well as its dynamics.