The battle to make us all safer drivers is one that the authorities in charge of our roads have been fighting for decades, and in many important ways, their efforts have been a success. From getting people to wear their seat belts to reminding motorists to “Think Bike”, the combination of road safety initiatives with developments in car technology has made it safer than ever to drive in the UK.
It isn’t only civic engineers, health and safety professionals and communications specialists who’ve had a role to play in these campaigns, however. Understanding human psychology is a key part of changing people’s attitudes and behaviour, both individually and across society as a whole, and psychological expertise has been vital to the progress we’ve made.
Encouraging people to drive more safely is an ongoing endeavour, and one where the study of human behaviour is continually leading to new innovations. Just this year, for example, a road safety scheme for motorcyclists saw great success in Scotland, using road markings which rely on “nudge psychology”. So how exactly does psychology feed into road safety initiatives?
What Causes Dangerous Driving
At the root of dangerous driving are the choices individuals make. It’s these choices that lead to what University of Utah cognitive neuroscientist David Strayer, PhD, calls the “four horsemen of death” – the human foibles behind more than 90% of vehicle crashes; speed, impairment, distraction, and fatigue. The question, however, is why people make poor decisions, such as driving while very tired, or checking their phone at the wheel.
The American Psychological Association reported in 2022 that psychologists around the world are delving into this question, “studying everything from basic perceptual processing to cognitive biases to the way the environment can make matters better (or worse)”. It was acknowledged that while people make errors, these errors can actually be precipitated by the systems that surround people.
Another factor is what a recent article from the BBC described as ‘Motonormativity‘ – prevailing cultural attitudes that can create dangerous biases across whole populations. For example, with motonormativity, it’s thought the presumption from both drivers and non-drivers that cars should take dominance on the road (as opposed to, for example, cyclists) can contribute to more aggressive, and therefore dangerous, driving styles.
Another way this bias plays out is the fact that, as a group, reckless drivers tend to underestimate the risks of speeding while greatly overestimating the time it saves them. Those prone to speeding often also believe they are particularly skilled drivers, and therefore an exception to the normal rules. In fact, this bias plays out amongst most motorists – most people rate themselves as an “above average” driver.
This trend towards the overestimation of skill and an escalation of risky behaviour is because “driving is dangerous, but not quite dangerous enough”, according to Ian Walker, an environmental psychologist at Swansea University. As he explained, “One of the basic elements of learning theory is that if an action doesn’t have consequences immediately, we’re very bad at learning”.
What this means on a practical level is that a person may drive too fast several times, but face neither penalty or accident – despite the risk of both being far higher. Over time, if that person continues to be lucky enough to avoid negative outcomes, the behaviour becomes normalised. The more people behave dangerously behind the wheel, the more this becomes accepted behaviour among communities as a whole, and contributes to a driving culture in which risky driving is considered the norm.
So how do psychologists suggest we address the systems and attitudes which make bad choices more likely?
Raising Awareness
One tool to counteract dangerous driving is to raise awareness through public information campaigns, which can slowly shift societal attitudes. A case in point is that of driving while impaired.
It seems unthinkable now, but when the government brought out legislation to curb drink driving, many saw it as an overreach of their power – an unnecessary meddling in the decisions of grown adults, who were far more relaxed in their attitudes on the subject.
This took a long time to change. Research carried out in 1979 (15 years after the first adverts highlighting the dangers of drink driving were aired) showed that nearly two-thirds of young male drivers admitted to drink driving on a weekly basis.
After many years of education, drink driving is considered by the majority of people to be a highly anti-social thing to do. However, the fact that drink driving is more common in rural areas of the UK is also illustrative of the fact that awareness isn’t the only part of the puzzle.
Creating Incentives & Disincentives
Drinking driving in rural areas is a good example of how various factors converge to unintentionally lead to dangerous driving.
On the systemic level, rural areas tend to lack public transport services and there are far fewer taxi drivers than you will find in towns, which limits people’s options. Alongside this, rural police forces are more stretched, with fewer officers serving larger areas, making the chances of being caught drink driving seem less likely than in town. Finally, because the act of drink driving is more common, it isn’t always frowned upon by peers and is therefore less socially embarrassing.
Part of discouraging poor road behaviour is ensuring that the right thing to do is as easy as possible – for example, by ensuring that buses and trains are running late enough for people enjoying a night out. Incentivising good behaviour can also be achieved by modifying the road environment (more on this later).
The threat of incurring a penalty also needs to be something people consider likely. Interestingly, traffic offenses increased in certain areas during the pandemic, because people knew that police oversight had been much reduced and the roads would be far emptier. In the USA, some daredevils even took part in what are known as ‘Cannonball Runs’, where cars race to drive from New York to LA as quickly as possible, with the record-breaker averaging over 112 mph.
This is why law enforcement is key in disincentivising reckless driving. If people have the present worry that they will receive a fine, points on their license, or even have their license removed, they are less likely to do dangerous things such as look at their phone while driving, or exceed the speed limit.
Modifying the Road Environment
There are psychological factors at play as people navigate the road environment, and there are many examples of how road systems can be designed to reduce human error. In Australia, for example, road designers have attempted to tackle the tedium of driving on the continents’ extremely long, straight roads by erecting signs with simple trivia questions – not enough to distract, but enough to keep drivers alert.
Road markings and signs are also used to nudge drivers subconsciously into slowing down. As described in the BBC Future’s article The road design tricks that make us drive safer, cities across the world have implemented successful schemes using road markings. In Chicago, for example, city officials successfully implemented optical illusion road markings, which used white lines painted at shrinking distances to give drivers the impression that they are going faster than they are – reducing crashes by 36%.
Road design features such as speed bumps, gateway treatments, pavement narrowing’s and chicanes can all be used to create physical barriers which force drivers to slow down. Other design choices can be made (at least in part) in order to obstruct drivers’ views of the horizon and move their focus close to the front of their cars, which can encourage more cautious driving – like medians, trees, and cycle lanes.
All these features either serve as a visual and tactile reminder for drivers to drive safely, or a subtle way to guide drivers into better behaviours on a subconscious level.
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Understanding the psychology of driving is one of the key aspects of making sure that everyone is as safe as possible on the road. In our three decades as a road marking contractor, and providing other road maintenance services, we’ve had the privilege of being part of promoting road safety and making sure people arrive at their destinations without incident. As research continues to reveal new insights into human behaviour, we’ll be interested to see how these findings impact road design.
