Our Focus
Google’s Waymo
Exploring Waymo's Impact on Young Female Commuters in San Francisco Through In-Depth Interviews
This is important due to the growing popularity of autonomous vehicles and concerns about safety, particularly in light of reported sexual assault allegations involving Uber and Lyft drivers.
Secondary Research
Research Plan
Recruitment & Interviews
Final Synthesis
DARPA Grand Challenges lead to the birth of autonomous vehicles, like Google's Waymo.*
Waymo currently reports growing interest in autonomous ride-sharing services.*
Waymo rides are more expensive and have longer wait and ride times compared to Uber.*
It was crucial to identify the cars, the OEMs and their market share.
It was crucial to identify the cars, the OEMs and their market share
A lot of data regarding waymo's safety was found through secondary reseach, mostly from waymo's own website.
We capred it to UBER to see why would users prefer waymo. over this and what we found was quite interesting
Cheaper
Shorted wait time
Shorted ride time
More expensive
Avoids highways
Less vehicles
A field study will be conducted in San Francisco, CA, targeting 6 female commuters. The study will span over a seven-week period. Each participant will undergo a 30-minute session that comprises an initial introduction, a structured interview, and a post-interview debrief.
Female commuters living in San Francisco, CA
Age range: 18 - 50
People who regularly use public transportation in SF, including but not limited to: Uber, Lyft, Waymo, Cruise, Muni, Bart, Caltrain
People with at least a moderate amount of experience using digital technology
People with at least a moderate amount of experience using digital technology
Our interviews spanned a four-week period. Each participant underwent a 30-minute session that compromises an initial introduction, a structured interview, and a post-interview debrief.
We made sure to emphasize the ethical considerations by introducing a consent form at the beginning of the interview, ensuring our participants are aware of the project’s scope and the use of their recoded data.
Our script then was designed to explore - Communication expertise, Understanding their personal background, their transportation choices, Safety considerations, Perception of autonomous vehicles.
The questions we’ve created dive into - Participant’s choices, Experiences, Perceptions of autonomous vehicles. We focused on the user’s feelings of safety and past experiences to uncover valuable information for the project.
From October 15 to October 21, 2023, we went around San Francisco and the CCA campus and hung up recruitment posters for our interviews.
The posters included a brief summary of the interview, an incentive, and a QR code with the interview screener form.
We were able to get a view into who our participants were through a screener.
We took around 6 interviews
San Francisco
San Francisco
San Francisco
The synthesis after all the interviews
After each interview, we took descriptive notes in a FigJam file, adding reactions to data that stood out to us.
From Interviews
25, Student, San Francisco
Takes the
Concerned for safety + ride quality
Thinks Waymo is a premium service
25, from france
Takes the
Concerned for lack of human intervention
Doesn't trust autonomous vehicles
it was clear that we need to conduct further research and design potential solutions aimed to foster a sense of safety among new-time users in their perceptions with Waymo’s autonomous vehicles.