The Role of Personality Characteristics in Young Adult Driving

Abstract

Background-Motor vehicle injury is the major cause of mortality among young adults. Information about the individual characteristics of those who drive dangerously could enhance traffic safety programs. The goal of this research was to examine the association between various personality-related characteristics and risky driving behaviors.

Which young people accept a lift from a drunk or drugged driver?

“…Risk-taking propensity appears to be the strongest predictor for competitive attitudes toward driving and for risky driving (Patil et al, 2006). DD is predicted by higher propensity for risk-taking, physical/verbal hostility, and tolerance of deviance for men and women (Patil et al, 2006).…”

“…Personality factors are also very commonly related to risk behaviours, and specifically to traffic risk behaviours (Begg et al, 2004;Dumais et al, 2005;Iversen and Rundmo, 2002;Nadal, 2008;Patil et al, 2006). Macdonald and Mann (1996) suggest that this sort of relationship could be disguised by alcohol use, since alcohol is linked to antisocial behaviours, aggressiveness and impulsivity.…”

“…DD is predicted by higher propensity for risk-taking, physical/verbal hostility, and tolerance of deviance for men and women (Patil et al, 2006). The presence of cluster B personality (borderline and/or antisocial) may increase the risk of young men dying in a road accident, especially those aged 25 or over (Dumais et al, 2005).…”

Modeling driver behavior in dilemma zones: A discrete/continuous formulation with selectivity bias corrections

“…Since the acceleration rates for those same drivers are not observed in the case where they stopped at the intersection, it may produce erroneous parameter estimates for the "stop" decision models. This is especially the case if the stop-go decision at yellow onset is significantly related to driver-specific attitudes and characteristics (Patil et al, 2006;Porter andBerry, 1998, 1999;Williams, 1997). A similar argument can be made for the "go" decision models, where drivers who are more likely to stop at the onset of yellow would be excluded from the observed dataset.…”

A comparison of web-based and telephone surveys for assessing traffic safety concerns, beliefs, and behaviors

“…Telephone surveys are a commonly used method of obtaining public opinions on a variety of public health issues, especially in traffic safety (Beck & Moser, 2006;Beck, Wang, & Mitchell, 2006;Beck, Yan, & Wang, 2009;Hartos & Huff, 2008;Patil, Shope, & Raghunathan, 2006;Simons-Morton, Hartos, & Leaf, 2006;Williams & Chaudhary, 2008). Indeed, telephone survey methods are used for national assessments such as the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey (CDC, 2009) as well as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Survey of Driver Attitudes and Behaviors (NHTSA, 2003).…”