Study Aims to Predict Driver Crash Risk

Two Professors of Psychiatry from the University of Western Ontario, Dr. Laurence Jerome and Dr. Al Segal, have completed the first part of a major study of a screening instrument that evaluates new drivers’ impulsivity in order to predict problem driving. They hope their work will ultimately result in proactive remedial measures for new drivers identified as being prone to unsafe driving behaviours. The Canada Safety Council contributed financially to the study, which will be presented at an international conference this November.

According to Drs. Jerome and Segal, impulsivity is a key characteristic in drivers who show unsafe behaviours such as speeding and aggressive driving. Impulsive individuals find it very hard both to delay responding to a situation, and to switch to a more appropriate response in an ongoing situation.

The volunteers for the study were students enrolled in driver training through a school board program. Their instructors applied a risk rating scale to identify the high risk drivers. They rated about 33 percent of the subjects as being at high risk of future driving problems. (In a larger, more representative sample, 25 percent were classed as high risk drivers.)

Some of the characteristics identified in the risk ratings were expected, while others provided new insights. For instance:

• Males were rated as significantly more at risk than females.
• Risk-taking lifestyle behaviors were not strongly associated with traffic collisions.
• A higher grade average was associated with lower risk ratings.
• The females in the sample had better impulse control than the males.

The second part of this study will follow the sample group over a four-year period. It will determine which combination of variables best predicts problem driving, over time, in the group of novice drivers known to be at increased risk.

 Prediction of Driving Accident Risk in Novice drivers in Ontario:  Part One: the Development of a Screening Instrument. Dr. Laurence Jerome and Dr. Al Segal, Adjunct Professors of Psychiatry of the University of Western Ontario and Consultants to the Amethyst School: Provincial Demonstration School with ADHD, London, Ontario. To be presented at the Second International Conference on Driver Behaviour and Training, November 15-17, 2005, Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K.

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