Emergency Medical Services (EMS) provide a needed and necessary service in the healthcare industry worldwide.However, many EMS agencies find themselves understaffed to fill the needs of the communities they serve. As aresult, this can lead to decreases in the quality of service provided in times of emergencies. Simultaneously,technology is advancing in driverless vehicles which pose the question of the possibility of building driverlessambulances and if so, patients’ willingness to ride in them. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determinepatients’ willingness to ride in an ambulance operated autonomously as opposed to one driven by a human. Affectmeasures were collected to determine if affect mediated the relationship between willingness to ride and the type ofambulance configuration. The research used a three-study approach to answer the research questions. First, a generalscenario was used to examine patient's willingness to ride in an ambulance based on a human or driverlesscondition. In Study 2, the affect was implemented to serve as a mediator between the type of operator, human ordriverless. In Study 3, the researchers used the six universal facial expressions to determine if specific emotionscould be identified as mediators between the condition and willingness to ride score. Through the three studies, thefindings indicated that patients were less willing to ride in the scenario where the ambulance was operatedautonomously than in the traditional configuration. A significant interaction was found between gender and type ofambulance configuration, where females were less willing to ride in the autonomous ambulance than males. Affectwas found to act as a mediator between willingness to ride and the type of ambulance. Additionally, through the useof the six universal facial expressions, it was determined that the mediating emotions for males were fear andhappiness, and the mediating emotion for females was anger. In general, participants were not willing to ride indriverless ambulances; however, this finding is also limited by the hypothetical scenario posed in this study whichwas the need to be transported to the hospital due to phoning 911 in an emergency. Additional research shouldinvestigate how patients would feel about riding in a driverless ambulance based on the type of condition as it ispossible the willingness to ride may be different in a non-emergency scenario. There may also be other factors thatcould predict a patient’s willingness to ride in a driverless ambulance. In summary, while driverless technology isbecoming a near-term possibility, further research is needed into whether patients would be willing to accept thistechnology for usage.
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