Autonomous Vehicles: Moral dilemmas and adoption incentives
研究自动驾驶汽车在事故中保护乘客还是行人的道德困境，发现人们偏好最小化伤害但更愿购买保护自己的车，监管者需平衡安全优势与采纳成本。
In unavoidable traffic accidents, autonomous vehicles (AVs) face the dilemma of protecting either the passenger(s) or third parties. Recent studies show that, in accidents involving an AV, most people prefer the AV to behave such that it minimizes expected harm. At the same time, however, they are more willing to adopt an AV if it prioritizes the passenger(s), i.e. themselves. A regulator therefore needs to set a rather high level of driver protection in order to increase the market penetration of AVs. Using a game-theoretic model, we analyze how the second-best optimal level of AV passenger protection depends on (i) the AV safety advantage, (ii) the intensity of drivers’ other-regarding preferences, and (iii) the (preference) cost of AV adoption. We show that a higher AV safety advantage may either increase or decrease the second best optimal level of AV driver/passenger protection. In an extension, we find that increasing the degree of driver protection has the additional benefit of leading to higher care levels of other road users such as pedestrians and cyclists.