Social routing recommendations delivered via navigation apps: Why do drivers deviate from their stated intentions?

To understand and explain drivers' route choice behaviour under social routing recommendations, this study investigates data from a mobile navigation app that captures drivers' stated route intentions before trips and their actual behavior during trips. An inconsistency that might happen while using navigation apps is that the drivers state they would follow a specific route but they deviate from the chosen route. To bridge this gap known as intention-behaviour gap, the present study analyses trip records from experiments conducted in two European cities: Helsinki, Finland, and Amsterdam, the Netherlands. By comparing the driver’s stated intentions with their actual behaviour, we define several levels of deviation and provide insights into the variance between intended and actual route choices, aiming to design efficient interventions to enhance compliance with social recommendations.
Using random-effects binary logit models, we examine the effects of various variables on the likelihood of deviation from the stated choice. The findings underscore the important role of travel time differences between the social and fastest routes, while also highlighting the impact of specific trip contexts such as rush-hour departure time and trip purpose. Understanding these factors can inform the design of traffic management strategies to encourage adherence to socially responsible routes, ultimately improving the overall network conditions.