Will Smart Improvements to Child Restraints Increase Their Popularity?

Abstract

In developing countries, child safety seat use remains low, which contributes to the consistently high rate of child injuries and deaths in traffic accidents. In order to protect the safety of child passengers, it is necessary to improve the public acceptance of child restraints. We improved the shortcomings of the traditional child restraints by adding some new features: 1, tightening Isofix automatically; 2, using temperature sensing, a high-temperature alarm, automatic ventilation, and cooling; 3, using pressure sensing, if the child is left alone it will set off the car alarm; 4, voice control to adjust the angle of the backrest; 5, the seat can be folded into the trunk. These functions make human-computer interaction more humane. The authors collected changes in parental acceptance of child restraints using the interview method and questionnaires. We found that acceptance increased significantly after making intelligent improvements to the child restraints. The authors used the Technology Acceptance Model to identify the key caveats influencing users’ use of intelligent child restraints. Performance expectations, effort expectations, social influence, convenience, and hedonic motivation positively and significantly impacted the willingness to use intelligent child restraints, so the authors suggest that these points should be emphasized when promoting the product. The current study findings have theoretical and practical implications for smart child restraint designers, manufacturers, sellers, and government agencies. To better understand and promote child restraint, researchers and marketers can analyze how people accept child restraint based on our research model.