The Role of Personality Traits through Habit and Intention on Determining Future Preferences of Public Transport Use

Abstract

A complex set of factors may affect transportation mode choice. While earlier studies have often considered objective factors in determining preferences of public transport use as a sustainable transportation, subjective factors such as personality traits are underexplored. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the influence of personality traits on the number of future public transport use. Additionally, “car habit” and “intention toward using public modes” were considered to be important. For this purpose, a case study from departure passengers at Imam Khomeini International Airport (IKIA, Tehran, Iran) was conducted between January and February 2015 at IKIA. Results of structural equation modeling (SEM) shows that only neuroticism and extraversion personality traits were significant in determining future public transportation mode choice. However, the model indicates that these traits indirectly influence intention and car habit. Neuroticism was found to have a total effect of −0.022 on future public transport use, which represents a negative association with public transport use, while extraversion positively influenced future public transport use with a total effect of 0.031. Moreover, the results found interestingly that car access had a better fit to the data than the number of cars in household (NCH); both had significant positive effect on car habit, but only car access had a significant influence on intention. Furthermore, the effect of socio-demographic variables such as age, gender, educational level, income level, and body mass index (BMI) were determined to be significant in identifying choice of future transport mode to airports, which is explained in the discussion section of this paper.

Introducing a three‐tier sustainability framework to examine bike‐sharing system use: An extension of the technology acceptance model

“…When it comes to sustainable extraversion, this personality factor is a good predictor of future sustainable behaviour. This is in contrast with the findings of Hirsh () and Hirsh and Dolderman (), who found extraversion had no influence on the values that encouraged sustainable behaviour; however, it corroborates the results of Yazdanpanah and Hosseinlou (). Therefore, understanding how outgoing, energetic and assertive (Milfont & Sibley, ) individuals are, and in relation to sustainability in particular, could help us better understand loyalty towards bike‐sharing systems.…”

“…The third tier of the proposed framework is the influence of an individual’s personality. Many authors used the big five personality traits approach to find out what influences sustainable behaviour (Farizoa, Oglethorpe, & Soliño, ; Hirsh, ; Hirsh & Dolderman, ; Yazdanpanah & Hosseinlou, ). Since Yazdanpanah and Hosseinlou () discovered that extraversion is the only personal trait of the big five that directly influences the intention to choose a more sustainable transport mode (in their case, public transport), we focused our research only on sustainable extraversion’s influence on bike‐sharing loyalty.…”

“…The big five personality traits approach is based on the idea that everyone’s personality can be described by the following five traits: extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and openness to experience (Ajzen, ; John & Srivastava, ). In recent times, researchers have begun to shed some light on how different personality traits can influence sustainable behaviour (Hirsh, ; Soliño & Farizo, ; Yazdanpanah & Hosseinlou, ). The predictive ability of the five personality traits to explain environmental concerns or environmentalism varies considerably in the literature (Hirsh, ; Hirsh & Dolderman, ).…”

“…The predictive ability of the five personality traits to explain environmental concerns or environmentalism varies considerably in the literature (Hirsh, ; Hirsh & Dolderman, ). Of the five traits, only extraversion was found to have a positive effect on decisions about buying and using environmental goods and services in different settings (Soliño & Farizo, ; Tang & Lam, ; Yazdanpanah & Hosseinlou, ). More specifically, Yazdanpanah and Hosseinlou () discovered that extraversion was the only trait which had a positive and significant effect on intention to use public transport, meaning the more an individual was lively, vocal, action oriented and enthusiastic (Kim, Schmöcker, Bergstad, Fujii, & Gärling, ), the higher their intention to use this mode of transportation.…”

“…Of the five traits, only extraversion was found to have a positive effect on decisions about buying and using environmental goods and services in different settings (Soliño & Farizo, ; Tang & Lam, ; Yazdanpanah & Hosseinlou, ). More specifically, Yazdanpanah and Hosseinlou () discovered that extraversion was the only trait which had a positive and significant effect on intention to use public transport, meaning the more an individual was lively, vocal, action oriented and enthusiastic (Kim, Schmöcker, Bergstad, Fujii, & Gärling, ), the higher their intention to use this mode of transportation. Analogous to this idea, it seems possible that users of the bike‐sharing system who like talking about sustainability will be more loyal to the system.…”