Welcome
to the REACT! Survey
A
research project by the Institute of Transportation Studies of UCI*,
Thank you very much for participating in the Toyota e.com program. The
primary goal of this experiment is to evaluate the potentials of such a travel
alternative as a means of reducing urban traffic and vehicle emissions. The
demand for travel is derived from the need to participate in activities,
therefore, a decision to travel using the shared-use vehicles can only be
understood by considering the entire activity scheduling process, both before
and after a shared-use vehicle becomes an alternative means of travel. To
examine this decision process and to evaluate this travel alternative, a unique
data collection procedure is applied to obtain the necessary information from
program participants.
The data collection process is proceeding in three
phases: (1) before the vehicle-sharing program, (2) during the program, and (3)
after the program is completed. A Computer- Aided Self-administered Interview
(CASI) program, REACT!, is being used to collect activity schedules from
participants. Each REACT! application surveys on a full week of activity
scheduling behavior for each participant and other adults in their households.
The data from the first phase will depict participants' typical weekly activity
programs before the alternative of shared-use vehicles is present. In the
second phase when shared-use electric vehicles are available, REACT! is used in
conjunction with the GPS tracking instrument, TRACER, installed in all program
vehicles. TRACER units integrate GPS
capabilities with wireless communications so the vehicles can be tracked in
real-time. While the tracking study is running continuously, the REACT! program
is being executed at regular intervals. During these weeks, the vehicle
tracings will be conveyed to participants as they utilize REACT!. In addition
to typical weekly activity schedules, this integration facilitates the exploration
of route choice dynamics that may be affected by the unique characteristics of
the electric vehicles. This scenario combines data on vehicle paths with
contemporaneous data on traffic conditions along that path and also with
information from respondents about why specific routes were selected. In the
third phase after the program concludes, the Phase 1 procedure is repeated to
see if there are any residual effects in participants' activity/travel
patterns.
To participate in the program, it is necessary that
you install the survey program, REACT!, in your computer (running
Windows 95, 98, 2000, Me, or NT). However, we have made the installation
process easy for you. After the survey is finished, you can completely remove
the program from you computer.
Only adult members of your household
need to participate in the survey. The survey is divided into two parts:
The Initial Interview consists of a
series of computer forms intended to collect basic household and personal
information. The Initial Interview should be finished no later
than the Sunday evening when the recording of Weekly Activity Diary
begins. It is preferable that you fill
out the Initial Interview before this Sunday so the amount of time you spend on
entering data could be reduced.
The recording of the Weekly Activity
Diary begins on a Sunday evening and ends on the next Sunday evening. Each
night (after 6:00pm), every adult member is expected to log in the program. On
the first Sunday evening, you will be asked to indicate the activities you know
you will be doing on each day of the coming week (i.e., from Monday morning
till next Sunday evening). On Monday evening, you will be asked to update what
you have actually done throughout Monday then indicate if there are changes to
the plans of the following days (i.e., Tuesday till Sunday). The process will
need to be repeated each evening of the surveying week.
If you have Internet connection, each day when you (and your spouse)
finish data entry, you can send the data to us. There is no need to worry about
the security of transferring data through the Internet!!! Before the data are
sent to us, they are compressed and encoded with passwords. Only we, the survey
administrators, know the password. If you do not have Internet connection, we
will send people to collect the data from you computer when the survey is
completely finished after the next Sunday evening.
We expect each participant to spend about 20 to 30
minutes each day to enter data. Participants can withdraw from participation
any time during the survey period. The investigator may also withdraw
participants at his/her professional discretion before the entire survey is
completed. However, because the survey is really intended to evaluate the
usefulness of e.com for Toyota, if you decide to withdraw, you also renounce
your right of using these electric vehicles.
If you are interested in learning more about the
survey, click on the topics below for more information.
Also, please view the Consent Form required by the University to see
what benefits and tasks you should expect from this study. You will need to
sign one of this form before your participation in the survey.
Program Download
If you are ready to install the REACT!
program, please click the download page. If you
prefer to install the program from a CD, please contact us. We will send a CD
to you as soon as possible.
Second Phase: REACT! and TRACER (Under Construction)
* This research has been reviewed
administratively and classified as exempt research by UC Irvine Institutional
Review Board Administration.