Does Money Matter? A Theory-Driven Growth Mixture Model to Explain Travel-Mode Choice with Experimental Data

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Abstract
In the present article we apply a growth mixture model using Mplus via STREAMS to delineate the mechanism underlying travel-mode choice. Three waves of an experimental field study conducted in Frankfurt Main, Germany, are applied for the statistical analysis. Five major questions are addressed: (1) whether the choice of public transport rather than the car changes over time; (2) whether a soft policy intervention to change travel mode choice has any effect on the travel-mode chosen; (3) whether one can identify different groups of people regarding the importance allocated to monetary and time considerations for the decision of which travel mode to use; (4) whether the different subgroups of people have different initial states and rates of change in their travel-model choices; (5) whether sociodemographic variables have an additional effect on the latent class variables and on the changes in travel-mode choice over time. We also found that choice of public transportation in our study is stable over time. Moreover, the intervention has an effect only on one of the classes. We identify four classes of individuals. One class allocates a low importance to both monetary and time considerations, the second allocates high importance to money and low importance to time, the third allocates high importance to both, and the fourth allocates a low importance to money and a high importance to time. We found no difference in the patterns of travel-mode changes over time in the four classes. We also found some additional effects of sociodemographic characteristics on the latent class variables and on behavior in the different classes. The model specification and the empirical findings are discussed in light of the theory of the allocation of time of Gary Becker.