Habit change: The case of persuasive ICTs on personal travel

Abstract

As mobile technology becomes ever more ubiquitous, making the choice to travel by public transport has never been easier. Still, the car is the preferred mode of transport, even within the large cities. This thesis looks at how ICT can change the habits involved when choosing modes of transport, by investigating the need for predictability within families with small children, how ICT can support those needs, and if persuasive technology can, using that knowledge, change those habits. Observations, customer journey map workshops and interviews form the empirical groundwork for the study, and literature reviews make for the main theoretical basis. The study found that predictability is important in an ontological security – context, and there are techno-logical solutions yet to be implemented, like predictive technologies and better real-time infor-mation. Persuasive technology is effective on small-scale behaviour changes, but public transport as a domain demands more complete habit-models than captology currently provides.