A growing body of international research on urban transport shows that women from all over the world are experiencing safety issues within today’s transport systems. Furthermore, these reports shed light on and discuss how gender bias within the transport sector contributes to this problem. To design future mobility services that everyone will use and enjoy, it is thus important to understand women’s travel needs and to involve a diverse group of users in the development process. With a vision of shaping mobility for a sustainable future NationalElectric Vehicles Sweden (NEVS) is developing a mobility solution consisting of connected, autonomous, and electrified vehicles designed and optimized for shared mobility within city environments. To address this issue in NEVS service this thesis applied an exploitative research approach to examining factors that affect women’s willingness to share rides with others(potential strangers) in a context where there is no driver physically present. The methodology, inspired by the ’Design Thinking’ framework consisted of two main phases:(I) Problem definition and (II) Concept development. To understand women’s safety issues within today’s transport system and frame the design challenge an extensive literature study covering the topics of women’s safety in public transport, technology acceptance, trust, and human-centered design was conducted. To further define user needs and encourage the end-users to take an active role in co-designing solutions for themselves two focus group workshops were held. The initial research and the results from the workshops further formed the basis for the subsequent Concept Development phase. A need for control over the shared travel situation revealed by the participants’ great demand for information led this phase to examine passengers' needs in relation to an In-Vehicle Information System (IVIS). Two prototypes were developed and further tested together with users to evaluate the proposed solutions. The results showed that the anthropomorphic system features used to create a more human-like interaction had a positive impact on the participants’ overall user experience and their perceived safety during a ’shared ride’ scenario. Having a female voice communicating system information made the participants feel less nervous, more comfortable, and more secure compared to when the same information was communicated solely by a visual interface. Other factors that had a major impact on the user experience in general and the perceived security were perceived Ease of Use (PEOU) and freedom of choice. The results showed how not understanding how to interact with the vehicle’s physical features had a negative impact on perceived safety while freedom of choice such as being able to book a specific seat in the vehicle is indicated to have a positive impact on people’s willingness to share their journey with a stranger.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Collaborative helping via social networking conversation threads can pose serious challenges in emergency situations. Interfaces that support complex group interaction and sense-making can help. This research applies human-computer interaction (HCI), computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW), and collaboration engineering in developing an interactive design, the Mega-Collaboration Tool (MCT). The goal is to reduce the cognitive load of a group’s growing mental model, thus increasing the general public’s ability to organize spontaneous collaborative helping. The specific aims of this research include understanding the dynamics of mental model negotiation and determining whether MCT can assist the group’s sense-making ability without increasing net cognitive load. The proposed HCI theory is that interfaces supporting collaborative cognition motivate contribution and reduce information bias, thus increasing the information shared. These research questions are addressed: 1. Does MCT support better collaborative cognition? 2. Does increasing the size of the shared data repository increase the amount of information shared? 3. Does this happen because group members experience 1) a greater sense of strategic commitment to the knowledge structure, 2) increased intrinsic motivation to contribute, and 3) reduced resistance to sharing information? These questions were affirmed to varying degrees, giving insight into the collaborative process. Greater content did not motive group members directly; instead, half of their motivation came from awareness of their contribution’s relevance. Greater content and organization improved this awareness, and also encouraged sharing through increased enthusiasm and reduced bias. Increased commitment was a result of this process, rather than a cause. Also, MCT increased collaborative cognition but was significantly hampered by Internet performance. This challenge indicates MCT’s system components should be redesigned to allow asynchronous interaction. These results should contribute to the development of MCT, other collaboration engineering applications, and HCI and information science theory.

Effective knowledge sharing within project teams is critical to knowledge-intensive professional service firms. Prior research studies indicate a positive association between trust, social-cognitive factors, and effective knowledge sharing among co-workers. The conceptual framework proposed here builds on these studies, and draws from theoretical foundations from the organizational behavior, psychology, information studies, sociology, and management literature on organizational trust and knowledge sharing, and identifies the most significant factors found to influence organizational knowledge sharing directly and indirectly through trust. The study makes methodological contributions in the form of conceptualizations for knowledge sharing behavior, trust, and tie strength. Also, it provides a more nuanced and focused analysis, by factoring for knowledge type and co-worker working relationship. Data were collected from 275 knowledge workers (‘legal professionals’ and paralegals) engaged in shared legal project work, at one of Canada’s largest multijurisdictional law firms. The nature of their work required a significant reliance on co-workers, for both explicit and tacit knowledge. Multiple regression analysis, among other statistical techniques, was used to test the hypotheses and determine significant relationships. Of the factors examined in the study, the three found to have the strongest effect on respondents’ trust in their co-workers were shared vision, shared language, and tie strength. Furthermore, the two factors found to have the strongest effect on organizational knowledge sharing behavior were trust and shared vision. Overall trust was also found to have a mediating effect between shared vision and knowledge sharing behavior, and between shared language and knowledge sharing behavior. A significant implication for practitioners is that effective knowledge sharing among co-workers requires a nurturing manager to work on developing co-worker trust and shared vision. Furthermore, a manager wanting to promote trust between co-workers must nurture shared language and shared vision.

Effective knowledge sharing within project teams is critical to knowledge-intensive professional service firms. Prior research studies indicate a positive association between trust, social-cognitive factors, and effective knowledge sharing among co-workers. The conceptual framework proposed here builds on these studies, and draws from theoretical foundations from the organizational behavior, psychology, information studies, sociology, and management literature on organizational trust and knowledge sharing, and identifies the most significant factors found to influence organizational knowledge sharing directly and indirectly through trust. The study makes methodological contributions in the form of conceptualizations for knowledge sharing behavior, trust, and tie strength. Also, it provides a more nuanced and focused analysis, by factoring for knowledge type and co-worker working relationship. Data were collected from 275 knowledge workers (‘legal professionals’ and paralegals) engaged in shared legal project work, at one of Canada’s largest multijurisdictional law firms. The nature of their work required a significant reliance on co-workers, for both explicit and tacit knowledge. Multiple regression analysis, among other statistical techniques, was used to test the hypotheses and determine significant relationships. Of the factors examined in the study, the three found to have the strongest effect on respondents’ trust in their co-workers were shared vision, shared language, and tie strength. Furthermore, the two factors found to have the strongest effect on organizational knowledge sharing behavior were trust and shared vision. Overall trust was also found to have a mediating effect between shared vision and knowledge sharing behavior, and between shared language and knowledge sharing behavior. A significant implication for practitioners is that effective knowledge sharing among co-workers requires a nurturing manager to work on developing co-worker trust and shared vision. Furthermore, a manager wanting to promote trust between co-workers must nurture shared language and shared vision.