The Impacts of Incentives on Seat Yielding Behavior on the Bus

The global target to achieve inclusive public transportation includes the availability of courtesy seating for vulnerable individuals such as elderly people, people with disabilities, pregnant women, and children. The frequent usage of courtesy seats by passengers who are not vulnerable individuals is an issue pertaining to public transportation. It is important to encourage the travelers to yield seats in the presence of vulnerable individuals because the latter might get seriously injured by falling if they stay on a moving vehicle. This study explores the influence of incentives and situational factors affecting individuals’ decisions to yield seats to vulnerable people. Through an online questionnaire survey, 404 valid responses were obtained. The generalized linear mixed model (GLMM) with repeated measures was used to identify the influential factors affecting the self-reported decisions of yielding seats to vulnerable individuals. The results indicate that the situational factors (health, crowd, vulnerable passenger type, standing time after yielding seats), incentive types, and incentive amounts are significant factors affecting the decisions to yield seats. The study’s findings also indicate that travelers are more sensitive to people with disabilities and pregnant women than to elderly people and children. The practical implications, including campaigning, education interventions, and incentive-based mechanism, were suggested to encourage travelers to yield seats to vulnerable individuals.