I'm from the UK, there's probably an element of cultural momentum behind it, but I suspect it may also be due to the less flat terrain: UK roads can be very un

I'm from the UK, there's probably an element of cultural momentum behind it, but I suspect it may also be due to the less flat terrain: UK roads can be very undulating and windy, for the couple of times I drove someone else's automatic car it always felt like I was waiting for it to figure out the correct gear - some of this is probably historically inferior designs, but the other element is anticipation... I can see the steep hill suddenly rearing up around the tight bend, I know to drop down in advance to keep the revs high if i don't want to start rolling backwards (or more realistically in todays cars, resulting in just slogging up it) - an automatic transmission can't do that, it has to wait to feel the load just before it's too late, I can also see the top of a hill quickly drop back down so i know exactly the right moment to shift up again - In short, I don't have to guess like the gear box because I can see and know when I'm going to need more or less torque. You actually see the same problem in new drivers, they don't anticipate or select the right gear so they crawl up hills and their cars speed tends to match the angle of the road, it's a bit like automatics are newbie drivers, they will eventually select the right gear but not before they've lost all their momentum and revs. I'd guess that the opposite is true for the US (which by comparison looks to be as flat as a pancake) for the very same reason, you don't need to anticipate gears when the terrain ahead is unchanging, once the box can infer you want to go faster and how much faster, making perfect timing for good acceleration is probably better than a human.