People, it turns out, are deeply conflicted when it comes to cars that can drive themselves. A new poll shows that while there s worldwide and widespread support for and fascination with self-driving vehicles, there s also a deep angst over the concept. And drivers in different parts of the world have distinctly different degrees of concern.The survey was done by researchers at the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute who built upon a previous study conducted with respondents in the United States, Great Britain and Australia. The latest work includes 1,700 respondents in China, India and Japan, and the results are intriguing.The pollsters found that about 87 percent of respondents in China and 84 percent in India have positive views regarding autonomous and self-driving vehicles, compared to 62 percent in Australia, 56 percent in the U.S., 52 percent in the U.K. and 43 percent in Japan. Half of the Japanese respondents were neutral, while the U.S. registered the highest percentage of negative views (16 percent) among the six countries. Interesting, considering that the US, with companies like Google in Silicon Valley leading the way, has been a pioneer in the field. It s not uncommon to see driver-less Google cars flying up and down Valley freeways as the cars are tested out, their autonomous systems tweaked for a better and safer driving experience.So let s start with the gas-tank-half-full lobby:It s after that point that the differences in opinion start to emerge, according to the study s findings:Their concerns, of course, are not difficult to understand. The pollsters found that Chinese and Indian respondents were more concerned about equipment failures, system and vehicle security (from hackers), data privacy (location and destination tracking), and interacting with pedestrians and bicycles than those in the study s other countries. Nonetheless, much higher percentages of Chinese (96 percent) and Indians (95 percent) are at least slightly interested in owning a self-driving vehicle, compared to those in Japan (77 percent), Australia (68 percent), the U.S. (66 percent) and the U.K. (63 percent).Credit: An artistic rendering of Google s self-driving car (Google via Associated Press)
