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Beyond Consumer Innovators: Adoption of Plug-in Vehicles by Mainstream Consumers in the U.K.

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Who’s Driving Electric Cars

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Mobility ((LNMOB))

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Abstract

This chapter discusses key methodological issues involved in researching potential Plug-in Electric Vehicle (PEV) uptake among mainstream consumers: all those who are not Innovators in terms of Rogers’ (Diffusion of innovations. Free Press, New York, 2003) diffusion model. In the U.K. in 2019 mainstream consumers do not have their own PEVs and have little or no direct experience of using them. Issues considered in this chapter include the problems of psychological distance, the Hawthorne effect, the “Bed of Procrustes”, and the role of symbolic meaning and self-congruity in influencing uptake. Two studies that have worked with mainstream consumer samples, one qualitative and one quantitative, are described in depth to illustrate how these issues can be addressed.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    We note that there is evidence for other social influences as well as diffusion operating in relation to adoption of PEVs. Axsen et al. (2013) explored these in a U.K. context.

  2. 2.

    Bunce et al. (2014) found more positive responses in a somewhat later U.K. study with PEV Innovators (though that might also in part be explained by later vehicle models being available for their study).

  3. 3.

    The authors withheld details of the specific models used since the research included evaluations of performance that might have conferred commercial advantage or disadvantage to manufacturers.

  4. 4.

    A z score expresses position of a value in relation to the mean and standard deviation of the distribution of scores in a “norm” group. A score of +1 in a particular trait indicates a position one standard deviation (of the norm data) higher than the mean of the norm data. In this case the norm group was a sample of around 3000 participants in an earlier study (Skippon 2014) in which participants attributed personality traits to a wide range of ICEV types (e.g. small hatchback, executive saloon, van, sports car).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lemonade Consulting Ltd., 2 Byron Close, Deeside, CH53TE, UK

    Stephen Skippon

  2. TRL Ltd., Crowthorne, UK

    Stephen Skippon & George Beard

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  1. Stephen Skippon
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  2. George Beard
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Correspondence to Stephen Skippon .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College London, London, UK

    Marcello Contestabile

  2. Institute of Transportation Studies, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA, USA

    Gil Tal

  3. Institute of Transportation Studies, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA, USA

    Thomas Turrentine

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Skippon, S., Beard, G. (2020). Beyond Consumer Innovators: Adoption of Plug-in Vehicles by Mainstream Consumers in the U.K.. In: Contestabile, M., Tal, G., Turrentine, T. (eds) Who’s Driving Electric Cars. Lecture Notes in Mobility. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38382-4_9

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