Investigating the effects of different types of travel information on travellers' learning in a public transport setting using an experimental approach

The effect of travel information on a traveller's decision making has been widely studied. However, its longer-term effect within the context of habitual travel, in which a traveller makes the same journey multiple times within a period of time and is exposed to the same travel information source repeatedly, is comparatively less investigated. A series of computer-based experiments were conducted to investigate the effect of information of various types and reliability on travellers' decision making over time. Participants were presented with repetitive departure time-choice tasks under several public transport scenarios in which the types of information and operating conditions were varied. Participants attempted a series of experimental sessions remotely from their work places using a simple program sent by email. This paper describes the design and implementation of the experiment, presents the preliminary findings, and discusses how such an experimental approach could contribute to existing knowledge of the inter-play between travel information and learning.