Gendered Travel Behavior and Sustainable Mobility

Travel behaviour varies across gender, reflecting social, economic and cultural norms shaping access to and choices of mobility options. Women often shoulder a greater share of care‐related tasks, leading to complex chains of short trips organised around household and familial responsibilities. In many contexts, this “mobility of care” remains invisible in transport planning, resulting in services that inadequately meet women’s needs. Simultaneously, evolving labour‐market roles, densifying urban forms and heightened environmental awareness are driving shifts in travel patterns. In several high-income economies, younger cohorts of women now match or exceed men’s mobility, signalling a break with historical trends. Attitudes towards sustainable modes—public transport, cycling and shared electric vehicles—tend to be more favourable among women, though concerns over safety, affordability and time constraints can limit uptake. Globally, transport systems that overlook gendered differences risk perpetuating inequalities and undermining climate objectives. Addressing these challenges requires gender-sensitive data collection, inclusive service design and policy frameworks that link care work, urban infrastructure and environmental goals. Case studies from Latin America, the Middle East and Europe highlight persistent barriers alongside emerging policy responses.

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Gendered Travel Behavior and Sustainable Mobility publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in gendered travel behavior and sustainable mobility across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Mobility of care: The ensemble of trips undertaken to provide and receive care, including both caregiving and self-care journeys, alongside the periods when care obligations limit movement.

Discrete choice model: A quantitative framework for analysing individuals’ selection among travel alternatives, typically employing utility‐based formulations (e.g. ordered logit) to estimate how socio-economic and attitudinal factors shape mode choice.

E-carsharing: A shared mobility service offering battery-electric vehicles on a membership or pay-per-use basis, combining carsharing principles with zero-emission technology to reduce both congestion and transport-sector CO₂ emissions.

References

1. Reconsidering mobility of care: Learning from the experiences of low-income women during the COVID-19 lockdown in Itagüí, Colombia. Habitat International (2023).
2. Attitudes and Behaviour towards More Sustainable Travel Options in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: An Emerging Social Change?. Sustainability (2023).
3. The gender turnaround: Young women now travelling more than young men. Journal of Transport Geography (2016).
4. Are women greener than men? A preference analysis of women and men from major German cities over sustainable urban mobility. Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives (2020).