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Article History

Received: 15 November 2022

Accepted: 31 August 2023

First Online: 26 September 2023

Declarations

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: We did not seek ethical approval from the ethics committee, as our study falls in the category where no such approval is necessary in Germany. This category spans all non-invasive, non-clinical research on human subjects, where subjects are transparently informed about the purpose, aim, and risks of the studies and when these risks are reasonably low. Prior to starting the procedure, they were informed that it is of high importance to understand free opinions and attitudes on sustainable mobility from the citizens’ perspective and that we were very happy if they would share their opinions with us. Still, however we stressed that they are free in taking part or not and their participation was completely voluntary. The participants were not reimbursed for taking part in the study. Further, we ensured a high standard privacy protection and let the participants know that none of their answers can be referred to them as persons. After these careful explanations participants reported to feel well informed about the purpose and the aim of the study and their freedom to quit participation at any time. All participants consented to take part in the study and were of legal age. Regarding the privacy policy explanations, the participants reported to understand that high standards were applied and deliberately accepted participation. Participant privacy is a key value that our university has committed itself to uphold. From the comments in the open question fields at the end of the survey, we learnt that those participants were interested in the topic and were keen to look at the results, which we assured them to receive.

: Participants provide data and this raw data is anonymized as data are by default stored in anonymized or aggregated form without the possibility of inferring details of individual persons. Nonetheless, this raw but anonymized/aggregated data can be made available on request for the sake of further research by the authors or the Chair of Communication Science at RWTH Aachen University. The participants were informed that the results of the study were intended to be used for scientific purposes and solely to be analyzed by the Chair of Communication Science at RWTH Aachen University. Also, they were informed that due to the applied high standard privacy protection none of their answers can be referred to them as persons. After these careful explanations on the use of their data, participants reported to feel well informed about the purpose and the aim of the study and their freedom to quit participation at any time as well as that high standards for privacy protection were applied. All participants were of legal age and consented to take part in the study under these circumstances. Our manuscript does not contain any individual details, videos, or images of individual persons.

: The authors declare that they have no competing interests.