The effect of a functional prototype on user acceptance in transportation: Assessing the level of acceptance before and after the first demonstration flight of an air taxi

Abstract

Prototypes support the development of new technology by enabling to collect user feedback before full market readiness is achieved. However, this potential is often not fully exploited as physical prototypes are mainly used at more mature levels of technology development, after demonstrating full functionality. Using physical prototypes that are not fully functional at an early stage of technology maturity could lead to lower resource consumption as customer feedback could be incorporated faster and acceptance could be established. However, previous research has indicated differences in consumer attitudes toward technologies before and after users have experienced prototypes first-hand. Therefore, this paper investigates whether experiencing a functional physical prototype at an early stage of technology maturity affects consumer perception. For this purpose, we utilized the first flight of an air taxi in Europe since we were certain that the technology had not been seen in action or used before. We conducted two studies: Study 1, with 126 potential users in a within-subject design, and Study 2, with 539 potential users in a between-subject design. We did not detect significant effects on the participants’ attitudes before and after watching an air taxi flight in person in either study. Overall, the data suggests that a live demonstration of a technology is not necessary to gain a comprehensive picture of peoples’ attitudes toward it, which creates the possibility of examining the effects of more inexpensive technologies, such as virtual and augmented reality simulators in mobility research.