Beyond Riding: Passenger Engagement with Driver Labor through Gamified Interactions

TL;DR

The paper investigates how to surface latent ridehail driver labor conditions to passengers using gamified, passenger-facing in-ride interactions. It employs an iterative, co-design process with nine workshops (19 drivers, 15 passengers) and four playable prototypes to assess engagement, knowledge gains, and solidarity shifts. Key findings show passenger knowledge gaps around pay, pickup logistics, and rating pressures, drivers' preference for immersive yet unobtrusive games, and design tradeoffs to enable driver–passenger solidarity and advocacy. The work offers design guidelines for human-centered algorithmic workplaces and suggests a pathway for consumer-driven labor advocacy through end-user auditing.

Abstract

Modern cities increasingly rely on ridesharing services for on-demand transportation, which offer consumers convenience and mobility across the globe. However, these marketed consumer affordances give rise to burdens and vulnerabilities that drivers shoulder alone, without adequate infrastructures for labor regulations or consumer-led advocacy. To effectively and sustainably advance protections and oversight for drivers, consumers must first be aware of the labor, logistics and costs involved with ridehail driving. To motivate consumers to practice more socially responsible consumption behaviors and foster solidarity with drivers, we explore the potential for gamified in-ride interactions to facilitate engagement with real (and lived) driver experiences. Through nine workshops with 19 drivers and 15 passengers, we surface how gamified in-ride interactions revealed passenger knowledge gaps around latent ridehail conditions, prompt reflection and shifts in perception of their relative power and consumption behaviors, and highlight drivers' preferences for creating more immersive and contextualized service experiences, and identify opportunities to design safe and appropriate passenger-driver interactions that motivate solidarity with drivers. In sum, we advance conceptual understandings of in-ride social and managerial relations, demonstrate potential for future worker advocacy in algorithmically-managed labor, and offer design guidelines for more human-centered workplace technologies.

Figures (9)

• Figure 1: Menu informs passengers about expected content and interactions, as well as driver preferences when selecting a game
• Figure 2: DRIVENis visual novel with point-and-click options that advance plotline of two NPC ridehail drivers
• Figure 3: TRIVIA RIDEis a timed challenge with optional driver interactions and embedded ridehail concepts
• Figure 4: DRIVING QUESTIONSbridges the driver-passenger social gap with conversation prompts for passengers (b) and drivers (c)
• Figure 5: TICKING ROADS simulates passenger pickup (logistics) and immediate feedback from "driving" a car on the map