Symbolism in California’s early market for hybrid electric vehicles

Abstract

This study explores the symbolic meanings being created, appropriated, and communicated by the owners of hybrid electric vehicles. As symbolic meanings are shown to be important to hybrid electric vehicle purchase and use, understanding the meanings, as well as their construction and communication, is essential for policy makers and others hoping to promote these new types of vehicles. Hybrid electric vehicles embody combinations of meanings that were previously unavailable from automobiles. Market observers who fail to recognize this struggle to explain why some people buy hybrid electric vehicles. They may characterize buyers as naïve about calculating payback on fuel economy, or dismiss owners as image-seeking environmentalists. This research belies such simplistic explanations. Through the telling and analysis of buyers' own stories, this study takes a robust approach to understanding the creation and spread of new symbolic meanings in the automotive market. Data were collected in ethnographic interviews with hybrid electric vehicle owners in the California, and analyzed using methods based on semiotic theory. In particular, the study explores how widely recognized social meanings (denotations) are connected to more personal meanings (connotations) and the effect that both types of meanings have on vehicle purchase and use.

Private household demand for vehicles on alternative fuels and drive trains: a review

“…Second, research from the 80s and 90s mainly focused on the potential demand for battery EVs [13,14,24,27,38,39,54,55,79,90], while studies from the late 90s and 2000s rather address a mix of AFVs including EVs, LPG, CNG or methanol [21][22][23]33,34,42,81,87]. In line with technological developments, recent research also concentrates on HEVs [3,10,26,29,31,32,45,49,53,72], PHEVs [ 9 , 11], bi ofuels [51,68,69,80,89,91], hydrogen [2,66,74,76,86] and HFCVs [46,61,62,65]. Finally, most literature has been published in America.…”

“…Europe is represented with 16 articles and Asia with 1 article. The bias towards California as the geographical focus of attention could be attributed to the heightened awareness of air pollution due to local conditions and press attention [37,87], its importance in global HEV sales (25 % of total US sales in 2006) [45], the low-emission vehicle regulations and state programs [39,87] and the highest count of Green Party registered voters throughout the US [53]. Only recently, European studies have gained in number, especially in the field of attitudinal surveys and preference valuation techniques.…”

Combining stated and revealed choice research to simulate the neighbor effect: The case of hybrid-electric vehicles

“…However, we opted for the MNL procedure in this study for simplicity, and also to avoid assuming a particular nesting structure. For instance, Heffner et al (2007) HEV weighting to all respondents. However, the weighting procedure used in this study only allows weighting by choice, not vehicle year.…”

Unbundling cars to daily use and infrequent use vehicles—the potential role of car sharing

“…To be able to show off the symbolic value, there must be awareness from others on the symbolic values. New technology in new vehicles can embody new meanings that have not existed earlier as Heffner et al (2007) find among the early adopters of hybrid vehicles in California. In this case, more than communicating an environmental awareness, the ownership of a hybrid vehicle also showed off intelligence and moral considerations for other people (Heffner et al 2007).…”

“…Fuel economy for example is a more functional aspect and might influence vehicle choice from a pure economical point of view, but may also have symbolic value such as environmental awareness and concern or in the case of the US even patriotism (Heffner et al 2007). The role of symbolic value is highlighted in studies of EVs and the early adopters of these (Noppers et al 2014;Schuitema et al 2013;Skippon and Garwood 2011).…”