Safe travel: Passenger assessment of trust and safety during seafaring

Across two studies, this paper explores passengers’ knowledge and perceptions of safety and risk during voyage at sea. Study 1 showed that, although overall safety knowledge can be considered good, some differences exist between groups of passengers. Younger passengers and passengers on shorter trips generally have less safety knowledge than older passengers and passengers on longer trips. Study 2 addressed the effects of two different formats of presenting safety relevant information on passengers’ perception of trust, safety and risk on board. Results showed that passengers receiving an in vivo safety demonstration and teaching session reported being better informed about safety and expressed higher levels of trust in the crew compared with passengers receiving on board video-only safety instructions. Thus, although video modelling can be an easy and inexpensive way to deliver safety information our results suggest that additional personalized and live demonstration quickly builds confidence and trust from passengers that represents an important asset for commercial transportation companies.