Accident; analysis and prevention
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Causation mechanisms in car-to-vulnerable road user crashes: implications for active safety systems.
Vulnerable road users (VRUs), such as pedestrians and bicyclists, are often involved in crashes with passenger cars. One way to prevent these crashes is to deploy active safety systems that support the car drivers and/or VRUs. However, to develop such systems, a thorough understanding of crash causation mechanisms is required. ⋯ The former issue suggests a role for various cooperative active safety systems, as the obstacles are generally impenetrable with regular sensors. The latter issue is less straightforward. While various systems can be proposed, such as providing gap size estimation and reducing the car speed variability, the functional merits of each such a system need to be further investigated.
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Crash risk factors related to individuals sustaining and drivers following traumatic brain injuries.
Some crashes result in drivers experiencing (or sustaining) a traumatic brain injury (TBI) while other crashes involve drivers that have already experienced a TBI. The objective of this study is to examine the factors that influence these two TBI crash groups. ⋯ Different factors influence the crash likelihood for those that sustain a TBI in a crash and those that crash following a TBI. In general, post-TBI drivers have a higher occurrence of multiple crashes and this should be further explored to guide driver rehabilitation, evaluation, and training.
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Stated response to increased enforcement density and penalty size for speeding and driving unbelted.
To what extent can traffic offences be reduced through stronger enforcement, higher penalties, and the provision of information to road users? This question was addressed with respect to the offences of "speeding" and "driving unbelted." Data were collected by a telephone survey of admitted speeders, followed by 438 face-to-face stated response interviews. Based on the data collected, separate statistical models were developed for the two offences. The models predict the behavioral effect of increasing enforcement density and/or penalty size as well as the additional effect of providing information to car drivers. ⋯ An increase in the penalty size is predicted to raise the stated wearing rate, which is already 90% in Austria. It seems that both the fear of punishment and the motivation for driving unbelted are limited, so that there is only a weak tradeoff between the two. This may apply to most traffic offences, with the exception of speeding, which accounts for over 80% of tickets alone, whereas all other offences account for less than 3% each.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study
The effect of a low and high resource intervention on older drivers' knowledge, behaviors and risky driving.
This study aimed to compare an in-class Seniors on the MOVE (Mature Operators Vehicular Education) interactive multi-session driving curriculum with a self-guided MOVE curriculum for older adults. Using a two group randomized design, we sought to determine if there are between-group differences in older drivers' knowledge and safety behaviors among participants. Forty-four participants with an average age of 79 years (SD=7.1) were randomly assigned to the original MOVE program (SOM-A) or a lower resource (SOM-B) self-guided intervention. ⋯ Mean behavior change scores for participants sitting 10-12 inches from the steering wheel were significantly more likely among SOM-A (mean=.65, SD=.5) participants than those in SOM-B (mean=.29, SD=.5, p=.01) at first follow-up. Taken together, these findings suggest that the more intensive program is more effective and that driving safety programs focused on behaviors to self evaluate driving abilities continue to be needed to help older drivers remain safer on the road as they age. The involvement of health care providers in such efforts may be an untapped potential.
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Electric bikes and regular bicycles play an important role in the urban transportation system of China. Red-light running is a type of highly dangerous behavior of two-wheeled riders. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the rate, associated factors, and behavior characteristics of two-wheelers' red-light running in China. ⋯ Two-wheelers' crossing behavior was categorized into three distinct types: law-obeying (44%), risk-taking (31%) and opportunistic (25%). Males were more likely to act in a risk-taking manner than females, and so were the young and middle-aged riders than the old ones. These findings provide valuable insights in understanding two-wheelers' red-light running behaviors, and their implications in improving road safety were discussed.