Understanding behaviour change in transport through longitudinal and multi-method approaches

Description

Despite technological innovations such as electrification, automation, and new mobility services like shared mobility, transport emissions are hardly decreasing. Achieving a sustainable transition requires a nuanced understanding of the psychological and contextual drivers of behaviour change in transport. This is the core aim of the URGENT project.
In this talk, I will introduce the project’s mixed-methods design, which integrates a seven-wave longitudinal panel survey, in-depth interviews conducted before and after significant life events, and continuous mobility tracking via a smartphone app. The app collected detailed trip and activity data over approximately nine months, offering high-detailed daily mobility patterns. Additionally, biweekly prompts captured evaluations of the pleasantness and ease of use of different transport modes, enabling a fine-grained analysis of evolving attitudes and behaviour change. This mobility data focuses on identifying the main triggers of behavioural change among individuals undergoing change processes, in contrast to a comparison group. This design allows us to disentangle the role of contextual shifts and psychological factors in shaping mobility preferences. The presentation will highlight key insights from the design and data collection process, outline our analytical strategy, and share preliminary findings from the mobility app data.

Period	29 Jan 2026
Event title	Mobility and Time Use : Capturing non-travel activities in travel surveys, innovating methods, generating insights
Event type	Workshop
Location	Dresden, GermanyShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International