Dr. Driving's Selection of Driving Psychology Issues
-- Part 4 --
Road Rage | Driver Education | Driving Personality

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Road Rage
Angry Drivers Cause Accidents, by Loretta Wilson

Quoting this article:

QUT Journalism/4EB Radio News Online
October 3, 1995

BRISBANE: A study's shown more than half the traffic accidents in AUSTRALIA may be the result of drivers suffering from ROAD RAGE.

The report, released by INSURANCE AGENCY AAMI (AMY), found many motorists suffer from ROAD RAGE or displaced anger which could be related to the emotional effects of the recent recession.

AAMI's SOUTH-EAST QUEENSLAND MANAGER CHRIS WALSH says accidents caused by ROAD RAGE can be avoided and usually occur either as rear-enders or failure by motorists to give right of way.

He says ROAD RAGE has become one explanation for the reasons for these types of accidents.

Mr WALSH says ROAD RAGE is anger associated with people who respond to situations irrationally and sometimes violently, and these affects could be related to the recession.

But, the PUBLIC RELATIONS MANAGER for the ROYAL AUTOMOBILE CLUB of QUEENSLAND, GARY FITE, says people have a number of things to get angry about.

He says it's too simplistic to relate anger to the recession.
Mr FITE says the ROAD RAGE theory's a phrase that's been popular in EUROPE and AMERICA, but it has no statistical backing.

He says these avoidable accidents are caused through lack of care by drivers.

There are two issues brought up here regarding road rage: the effect of daily stress (recession, etc.) and insufficient social responsibility (or lack of care). Both effects can be counteracted through the AWM Threestep Program namely, first, acknowledge ("A") that road rage is a symptom of your being out of control. Second, witness ("W") your hostile thoughts and feelings while driving; and third, modify ("M") your driving personality one habit at a time.

Here is a major task to accomplish: How to bring drivers to make that first step -- to acknowledge that they're emotionally out of control, either because they feel road rage or because they don't care enough to be prudent and compassionate.

I think this is going to take a community effort. For instance:

  • Start road education in first grade and continue all the way through driver ed in high school and continuing road education for all drivers as part of licence renewal
  • Road education at all these levels should focus on teaching self-management skills in three areas of one's driving personality:

(1) Affective

  • developing feelings of social responsibility
  • acquiring altruistic motives
  • capable of enjoying the flow of traffic whatever it is
(2) Cognitive

  • learning to recognize erroneous thought patterns while driving
  • acquiring an objective interpretation of driving exchanges
  • capable of understanding safety issues like an expert
(3) Sensorimotor

  • being able to stay calm and alert while driving
  • acquiring good perception and awareness
  • capable of handling the car under all conditions
I develop these ideas in further detail in the chapter called The Nine Zones of your Driving Personality

Driver Education
Date: 1997/07/29
Message-Id: <448@altheim.win-uk.net>
Newsgroups: uk.misc,uk.transport,uk.politics.misc,uk.politics.environment

Referring to what others have written:

What this has to do with women drivers and insurance, I have no idea.

My girlfriend drives skillfully.

Well good for her. I have nothing but praise for any woman who takes the trouble to learn to drive well and confidently. My whole point is that very few women do. Whilst I acknowledge there are bad male drivers, at least, as a gender, they tend to get the fuck out of my way. It's the slow, timid ditherers who get in front of me who cause annoyance.

I presume you mean the ones who keep to the speed limit.

Yes.

By that I mean, they get in everyone's way and make themselves a danger. That is a fact which is not reflected in insurance companys' statistics.

Since they cause less accidents I fail to see how they are a danger.

But they do cause the accidents - that is the whole point you see. Females by nature are not aggressive, so many stick rigidly to a speed *they* feel comfortable with when the stream of traffic is trying to move steadily at a faster rate. Even if the stream is breaking the limit for that road, any person, male or female, who drives slower than the stream is creating a hazard. Similarly, a person who brakes erratically and often, for reasons not apparent to the driver, behind is also a hazard.

Any professional driver, or indeed anyone who drives a lot, must have noticed that the vast majority of such hazardous drivers are women.

... It may take skill to drive aggressively and not cause accidents but I do not consider that praiseworthy.

Really? Then all I can say is, you have a strange sense of priority.

Driving Personality
Date: 1997/07/26
Message-Id: <33da8878.110f@netins.net> Newsgroups: alt.callahans

There's always an asshole in a sport-utility vehicle...which brings up a related question. Are SUV-drivers jerks everywhere, or just in Austin? I've come close to getting creamed twice by them, and I've seen lots of near-misses that I wasn't involved in...

"It ain't just SUV drivers, Anne, it's Suburban drivers, too. You can ask my-cousin-the-bicycle-coordinator who damn near got his ticket punched for good when he was riding on Red Bud Trail and got creamed by an aggressive Westlaker. He was weeks in the hospital, and months healing even more-or-less."

Suburbanites, AAARRRGGGGHHHH. Living in *God's Country* city folk just don't have any appreciation for the slow pace of things in the country, i.e. tractors, trucks with trailers, scenic-bicyclers, sunday drivers. Since this has been happening all my life (mumble mumble years), I have grown accustom to the antics of the city folk who have no patience for these things. It makes me chuckle and wonder how they have survived this long with such limited intelligence.

The one that always makes me laugh and honk my horn, is the person who has been trying to pass the slow moving vehicle for some miles and finally decides to break a few laws to get there 10 minutes faster and couple of miles down the road you find them with a trooper and hopefully a ticket to remind them that life isn't a race, it's a strategy game.

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