Recent studies have analyzed travel behavior over the life course through the lens of the mobility biography approach. Similarities in the effects of certain key events on travel behavior have been ...found. At the same time, family background influences changes in travel behavior in the long run. However, to date, the role of parents’ mobility behavior on their adult children’s mobility behavior has not yet been analyzed. In addition, there has been no empirical analysis of mobility biographies that simultaneously considers aging, key events, changes in residential location, changes in commute distance and parental socialization. This paper uses intergenerational mobility biographies and investigates the role of these variables in explaining changes in car availability and commuting mode use. To this end, a unique retrospective dataset is used of more than 1600 mobility biographies of persons born around 1957 as well as the mobility biographies of their parents. Markov models are used to analyze mobility behavior over the life course. The results show that parents’ behavior is not directly associated with the behavior of their adult descendants. However, age, attitude towards the car, gender and changes in the built environment are important predictors for dynamics in car availability. Commute mode changes are dominantly associated with changes in commute distance but also with changes in car availability and attitude. Key events such as divorce or childbirth are less important. The results suggest that there are indirect parental socialization effects via residential location and attitude on car availability and commute mode use. This paper points out the importance of the life course, changes in commute distance and changes in the built environment for car availability and commute mode use and is an example of the application of Markov models for the analysis of quantitative mobility biographies.
Travel is one of the most important facilitators of life and has been widely acknowledged as a prerequisite for economic and social activity. Research developing in recent decades has found that ...limitations to mobility and accessibility can reduce satisfaction with life. To date, research in this field assumes a linear and one-way relationship between the two—i.e. that ‘more mobility’ results in ‘more life satisfaction’. Yet diminishing marginal returns on happiness are found in many related fields such as economics, and there is always the possibility that happier people travel more than unhappy people. To the authors’ knowledge, this paper presents the first attempt to look for evidence of a non-linear relationship between mobility (measured as trip-making) and life satisfaction, and the first to test the direction of causality between the two factors. It uses a sample of some 1500 adults in the Netherlands Mobility Panel. Linear and segmented regression models were used to associate trip-making with satisfaction with life, when controlling for income, age, self-rated health and other demographics. Counter to expectations, five different model specifications suggest that the relationship between trip-making and satisfaction with life is linear. Furthermore, a structural equation model found that the relationship between mobility and satisfaction could run in either direction. This study questions many of the assumptions made about the relationship between transport and subjective well-being. Given the increasing prominence of this topic, much research is needed to further explore these complex relationships.
•We extend Schwartz’s integrated model of ethical decision making and apply it to the context of aggressive driving.•The conceptual analysis shows that the moral value-aggressive driving relationship ...is rather indeterminate.•Results show few and rather weak empirical relationships between moral values and committed aggressive driving behaviors.
Risky and aggressive driving is an important cause of traffic casualties and as such a major health and cost problem to society. Given the consequences for others, risky and aggressive driving has a clear moral component. Surprisingly, however, there has been little research on the relation between morality and risky and aggressive driving behavior. In this study we aim at addressing this gap. First, we present a conceptual analysis of the relationship between moral values and aggressive driving behavior. For this purpose, we extend Schwartz’s integrated model of ethical decision making and apply it to the context of aggressive driving. This conceptual analysis shows that moral decision-making processes consist of several stages, like moral awareness, moral judgment and moral intent, each of which are influenced by individual and situational factors and all of which need to materialize before someone’s generally endorsed moral value affects concrete behavior. This suggests that the moral value-aggressive driving relationship is rather indeterminate. This conceptual picture is confirmed by our empirical investigation, which tests to what extent respondents’ moral values, measured through the Moral Foundation Questionnaire, are predictive of respondents’ aggressive driving behavior, as measured through an aggressive driving behavior scale. Our results show few and rather weak empirical relationships between moral values and committed aggressive driving behaviors, as was expected in light of our conceptual analysis. We derive several policy implications from these results.
To contribute to existing research on the influence of various factors on household car ownership in the Netherlands, this study addressed the question whether and to what extent the influence of ...economic, sociodemographic, and spatial factors on the number of cars owned by households has changed over time. There seems to be an absence of studies investigating the changing influence of these factors on car ownership in recent decades, and in the Netherlands. The study used the statistical method of ordered logistic regression on household mobility data on 162,593 households, collected by the National Traffic Survey of the Netherlands in 1987, 1991, 1995, 1999, 2003, 2010, and 2014. The results show that the influence of household income, size, composition, gender, age, education, working status, and suburbanization levels on car ownership changed substantially between 1987 and 2014. The strong influence of household income on household car ownership diminished quite remarkably between 1987 and 2014, whereas the influence of household size grew significantly during the period. The results could serve as a first step toward a predictive model that endogenously estimates household car ownership levels in the Netherlands.
•Social norm towards flight-related carbon offsetting are examined.•Respondents gained utility from carbon offsetting.•People gain more utility from carbon offsetting when collective participation ...rates are high.•Baggage allowance and the eco-efficiency strongly influence respondents’ airline choices.
This study investigates the idea that people’s willingness to offset flight-related carbon emissions is a function of the collective participation rate, which can be regarded as a social norm, towards carbon offsetting. Additionally, we reveal people’s preferences toward two other environmental policies; a baggage allowance and airline eco-efficiency index. A discrete choice experiment is designed and administrated among a sample of air travelers. The results indicate that carbon offsetting generates utility, with people gaining more utility when the collective participation rate is high. Additionally, it was found that the baggage allowance and the eco-efficiency index strongly influenced respondents’ airline choices. People also became more sensitivity towards a baggage allowance and the eco-efficiency label, when the collective offsetting rate was high.
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