Report 1
My Understanding of Driving Psychology
By Lida Atkinson
Instructions for this report are at:
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/409a-g25-report1.htm
G25 Lecture Notes on Driving Psychology are at:
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/409a-g25-lecture-notes.htm
Section A: Two Stages of a Driving Personality Makeover Plan
Road rage has been called an epidemic by the media, a disorder by psychiatrists and big societal problem by just about anyone who has taken pen to paper concerning this topic. This report will summarize and interoperate a selection of articles that covers various aspects of road rage. As a new field of research in psychology, road rage is going through its infancy, and just as a baby starts with a name, so does the research into road rage. Dr. Leon James and Dr. Dian Nahl in their article “Dealing with stress and pressure in the vehicle: Taxonomy of Driving Behavior: Affective, Cognitive, Sensorimotor”, lay down a framework that categorizes or names crucial driving behaviors. Table 3, found at www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/409a-g25-lecture-notes.htm#charts, uses the new taxonomy to formulate a two stage process that Drs. James and Nahl call “a driving personality makeover.”
Driving requires a mental effort. In fact, all human activity requires some mental exertion, from dreaming to flying an airplane. In psychology, these efforts are divided into the affective, cognitive and sensorimotor domains. The affective domain is where our feelings are stored, but even more than feelings; it is where beliefs about our selves and the world around us reside. People’s convictions about driving are as diverse as the people themselves are, but Drs James and Nahl have efficiently divided them into positive and negative. A negative affect would be a belief ownership of the road and the positive would be that we all share the road.
The cognitive domain is where our skills are developed and expanded. The skills of a driver most likely start forming as soon as we take our first car ride as a baby. We develop our style of driving from watching our parents drive and other early driving experiences. An important part of the cognitive domain is risk assessment. The ability to determine what is dangerous to us and to others starts slowly and is improved with experience. The teen driver often fails to evaluate properly the dangers of driving aggressively but by the time they reach their mid-twenties this skill is much improved.
The sensorimotor domain gains the most attention. Driver’s education is almost wholly dedicated to the mechanics of driving. There is a mountain of research on reactions and attention. It tells us what distracts us and what makes us loose our attention when we are driving. Engineers design cars and roads with the intent to maximize a driver’s attention and reaction times.
The three domains are divided further into positive and negative or skills and errors. Probably the most important function is the identification of normative driver behavior. This knowledge might help drivers identify parts of their driving personalities that need improvement. It would also provide a lexicon for diver’s education and possibly the legal system. At the very least, it offers a basis for additional research.
Just as the baby, once given a name, begins to develop, the three domains have been named and now the authors identify the three growth stages of each domain over the course of the driver’s life. Proficiency is the period of learning to drive. The affective domain learns the rules and regulations on the positive side and disregard for the rules on the negative side. The cognitive domain starts unaware of driving situations, which is negative if or until situational awareness is developed. The actions or inaction of the driver is in the sensorimotor domain.
The next stage is safety and as the old adage says “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” The affective safety stage pits defensive driving and the feelings of sharing the road with antagonistic driving and the driver’s belief that they own the road. The cognitive safety stage is defined by the attributions of the driver. Does the driver observe an old person on the road and think, “all old people drive slow, they don’t deserve to have a license” or does the driver think “that driver has a right to his driving style?” The sensorimotor domain of the driver at the safety stage will either, wave kindly as they pass the other driver or flip them the “bird.”
The last stage of the maturing driver is responsibility. The affective domain has grown to either, unselfish driving with common values or self-centered driving with little regard for others. If the cognitive responsibility has matured in a positive manner, the diver will form mental images that help them understand and forgive other divers, but if the development is negative then the diver will form rage from any perceived slight. On the positive side of the sensorimotor responsibility stage, the driver will experience relaxed muscles and a general since of well being. The negative side of the sensorimotor responsibility stage will tense the muscles and raise the blood pressure leaving the driver in a constant state of “fight or flight.” This state has been linked to many diseases including heart disease, cancer and depression and is commonly known as stress.
Dr. James and Dr. Nahl have given us 18 zones of driving behavior. They feel like their anatomy of a driver is starting place for further research. They feel that there may be more behaviors to identify and complex relationships between the stages that could be used to help reduce road rage, but that the 18 zones can be used now to stimulate self-witnessing of driving behavior. Self-witnessing is often the first step to changing undesirable habits formed over the lifetime of a driver and to that end they have given us table 3 found at www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/409a-g25-lecture-notes.htm#charts, titled “Two Stages of a Driving Personality Makeover Plan.”
The plan is broken into two parts. The first section tells us what tools we are required to have in our mental arsenal that will help us circumvent the trap of aggressive driving. The next section takes us to the next level and shows us the path to being what the authors call a “supportive diver.” Both levels are broken into the three domains, affective, cognitive and sensorimotor and both sections give a detailed list of the feelings, skills and actions that are needed to fulfill the goal of becoming a “supportive driver.”
The order to table 3 is quite important because, while it is broken into the two stages, it is really more like a pyramid. Each level must be constructed and solid before the next can be realized. The first stage in the first level is a willingness to accept change in the driver’s affective domain. In order for anyone to change, they must, first, be willing to admit the need for change. They must tolerate others to critique their driving and allow for the possibility that the criticisms true. Accurate self-report may be extremely helpful in this process. After a driver becomes aware of a deficiency in their driving, keeping and accurate journal of when, where and in what context the behavior happens, makes it feasible to enact a program for change.
The foundation of avoiding becoming an aggressive driver is deciding to drive with higher morals and sense of fairness. The key is not accepting critical and degrading thoughts about other drivers, instead, replace them with empathy. When a triggering event takes place, such as a speeding driver cuts off an aggressive driver, the aggressive driver needs to remember an occasion that he or she was late and driving fast. This helps the aggressive driver empathize with other drivers and reduce their anger response. In time, the aggressive driver and those wishing to avoid becoming and aggressive driver will feel a sense of community on the roads and forgiving attitude towards those that break the rules of courtesy.
The cognitive level of the first stage builds upon the affective level. With the successful conquering of resistance to change, concluding that the blame for bad driving is not always on the other driver is an easy step. Being able to empathize with other aggressive or inattentive drivers allows for the removal of fault and the attainment of rational analysis of events on the road. Self-talk is an effective way to achieve proper reasoning, saying “Maybe that driver is having a bad day” or “I am not going to be a driver that puts other people in danger,” helps to understand other drivers’ motives and not repeat their mistakes.
Actions are the true test of a successful completion of stage one. After the affective level learns to conquer resistance to change and the cognitive level becomes skilled at cogent analysis of traffic events, the sensorimotor level follows with actions. Obeying road rules, such as signaling lane changes and not tailgating are considered civil behavior. Even on the occasion when a driver may not feel like obeying the rules, pretending the feelings and incorporating the actions help the driver move on from the first stage of avoiding becoming an aggressive driver and moving on to the second stage becoming a supportive driver.
The affective level of the second stage is just a matter of maintaining what was started in the level one. The driver must own the feelings of responsibility for miscalculations and look for ways to repair situations. The supportive driver truly welcomes the critiques of passengers and forgives the trespasses of other motorists. The most important part of mastering the affective level of stage two is truly feeling good about being a supportive driver.
Requiring a modicum of effort, the cognitive level of the second stage involves an awareness of common errors and a definite plan for addressing those problems. This can be accomplished by keeping a journal of driving and identifying those habits that need to be tackled, and then create a strategy that to avoid the trigger of the bad habit, such as, leaving earlier to avoid speeding to make up time.
The final piece of the “becoming a supportive driver” puzzle is the sensorimotor level of stage two. This is the top of the pyramid, the culmination of all the hard work from the levels and stages that came before and a very simple principle, be happy. Be the contented driver that foresees the needs of other drivers and makes room for them on the road. Say pleasant things to your self and others and the most essential part of the “Two Stages of a Driving Personality Makeover Plan” is to enjoy the driving experience. Since the first cars rolled off the assembly line, Americans have had a love affair with the open road. Now that the road is a little more crowed it may take a little more effort but we should not give up our love of driving.
In describing the diver personality makeover plan to friends, the one theme that was repeated by everyone was “But that is just common sense.” Yes, the makeover is common sense but as one friend stated, “I have often thought that I should do some of the stuff in the plan but I would never have put it all together.” This is where the plan excels, Dr. James and Dr. Nahl give us a wealth of information on the psychology of driving and they break it into small, easily palatable pieces. Then they use their new taxonomy to lay out a step-by-step plan for implementing change.
I asked several friends the same questions to ascertain a consensus of opinion:
1. If you received the training today, would you use the plan?
a. “I would give it a try. I not very good and keeping any kind of journal so that part might be hard.”
b. “No, I would not use it. I am a very good driver and do not try to chase people down on the highway. I think this would be best for people that are already diagnosed with road rage.”
c. “Just hearing it explained like you did will make me more aware of the process and I think I will think about it a lot more than I did before, but I would have to be convinced that I had some of the really bad habits before I would put in a ton of effort.”
2. How effective do you believe the plan would be?
a. “I think it would be very effective for people that wanted to change.”
b. “It might be effective in the short-term, but people basically don’t change and I think they would revert back to their old habits.”
c. “Very effective, once people see themselves through other people’s eyes and that actions affect more than themselves, they are usually motivated to change and this gives them the tools to change.”
3. Do you believe that the plan aught to be taught to children? What age?
a. “I actually think that teaching this to children would be more effective that adults that are set in their bad habits. I would start around the 5th or 6th grade, because this is the age that kids start thinking about themselves as drivers.”
b. “I don’t think there is room in children’s curriculum for something they are not going to need until their 16. Right now, teachers are having a hard enough time teaching kid to read and write. Maybe it could be added to driver education so that it is taught when it is needed.”
c. “The younger the better, I think all kindergarteners go through a bike safety course where they ride the tricycles around the mini-town, you could start teaching them how to be supportive riders and just keep going with it all the way through school.”
Clearly, the “Two Stages of a Driving Personality Makeover Plan” makes sense to most people. They see the value in identifying the different zones of driving behavior and creating a taxonomy that allows everyone to understand the psychology of driving. Where opinions begin to diverge is when it becomes personal. Some people are less willing than others to examine their behavior and even more people are less willing to change their behavior. The two-stage plan requires that there be a willingness to both examine and change behavior, so this needs to be a major focus the plan. More attention needs to given to simplifying the identification of bad driving habits and step-by-step guide for changing drivers attitudes.
Section B: Driving Psychology
We begin to learn how to drive the first time we get in a car. A baby tucked tightly in his car seat learns how the motion of the vehicle affects them, the rocking and swaying that puts them to sleep or the sudden stop with screeching tires that makes the wail. Since babies are always aware of their parents’ mood, they know if the parent is comfortable behind the wheel or angry and aggressive. Either they learn that the car is a happy, comfortable environment or they learn that the car is stressful, scary place.
The mechanics of driving come later. Children first learn to crawl, walk, run, ride a bike, and then drive a car. Their first attempts are filled with starts, stops, and stalls, yet they quickly master the techniques that are physically required to drive a car. At the same time a child is learning to, first, be a passenger then a driver, they are learning about the world around them. They learn how to react to situations from the model of their parents. If the car has always been a comfortable environment for the parents, then it will be for the child.
In his lecture notes, (http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/409a-g25-lecture-notes.htm) Dr. James, says that there are 11 basic principles in driving psychology. The first is that driving is a set of actions and reactions working together with our acquired moral values. Dr. James calls this complex state of thoughts, emotions and behaviors, driving norms and often finds it useful to approach driving psychology from the perspective of these three domains. He feels that each generation builds on the last generation’s norms and that we are currently in a negative trend.
The primary affective (thoughts) norms for this generation are described in animalist terms; dominance, territory, intolerance of diversity, revenge, acceptance of impulsivity and risk taking by society. Dr. James feels that society has come to glorify these negative affective norms and his views are understandable when you spend an hour watching TV and counting the how many times aggression is praised and held up as a standard for our society to aspire to. He believes that we, as a society, need to turn our backs on the glorification of anti-social behaviors and attempt to increase the attractiveness of helpful and supportive driver norms.
It follows that the primary cognitive (emotions) norms for this generation are also negative. Assessing the risk of driving is a skill that has become passé, just browse through the video’s on UTube.com and the majority of clips will highlight young men taking extreme risk of their health and life. Instead of learning from others mistakes, this generation seems bent on one-upping the last crazy stunt. The aggressive driver rarely sees themselves as unable to judge risk,
Primary cognitive disorders are characterized by the inability to properly react to social cues and poor impulse control. Antisocial personality disorder has many similarities with “road rage” and is often described in the same language as “road rage”.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (American Psychiatric Association, 1994, pp. 649-650) describes Antisocial Personality Disorder as:
“a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others occurring since age 15 years, as indicated by three (or more) of the following:
· failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors as indicated by repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest;
· deceitfulness, as indicated by repeated lying, use of aliases, or conning others for personal profit or pleasure;
· impulsivity or failure to plan ahead;
· irritability and aggressiveness, as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults;
· reckless disregard for safety of self or others;
· consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain consistent work behavior or honor financial obligations;
· Lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another.
The individual is at least 18 years, there is evidence of Conduct Disorder with onset before age 15 years, and the occurrence of antisocial behavior is not exclusively during the course of Schizophrenia or a Manic Episode.”
The inability to assess risk, self-serving explanation of events and lack of emotion are all typical symptoms of the antisocial person. The treatment for antisocial personality disorder is very similar to Dr. James and Dr. Nahl’s “Two Stage Personality Makeover Plan”. It involves learning to reassess social situations and to provide proper responses, relaxation to decrease the anger response, and self-witnessing to improve empathy.
The primary sensorimotor driving norms are developed over the life-time of the driver. The first time a driver gets behind the wheel of a car, they realize that their perceptions are greatly skewed. Learning how hard to push the gas or the brake or when to start a turn is quickly learn by a new driver and a supportive driver continues to acquire new skills trough out their driving life. However, an aggressive drive will become competent in the basic driving skill and never progress. He will rely on automatized habits and excuse any lapses or errors on someone else.
Dr. James and Dr. Nahl feel that aggressive drivers can and must change, that we as a society need to create an environment that rewards positive change and does not tolerate the negative habits of the three domains. If we are able to create this atmosphere then aggressive drivers will choose to change their patterns and once they are willing to change then a plan for improvement can be implemented.
Leaving the responsibility for creating change on the shoulders of the legal system has shown itself to be an ineffective method to promote supportive driving. Just as the penal system is less efficient at treatment than intervention before a crime, receiving monetary penalty after an aggressive driving event is less likely to promote true change than a comprehensive program of driver training that includes methods promoting supportive driving.
A technique used by Industrial/Organizational psychologists to reduce resistance to change is called “Large Group Theory.” The theory is that, the larger the group (usually 12 or more, but higher numbers are superior,) the less resistance is encountered when implementing change. The change process moves from incremental change to fundamental, organization-wide change. The authors have addressed the problem of aggressive drivers that continue to resist change by forming QDC’s (Quality Driving Circles). These circles focus on positively influencing change using the principles of driving psychology.
Training is the key to the QDC program. Drivers spend years developing bad habits; they are rarely precise in their self-assessments, risk taking, error recovery, and emotional control, unless they are trained to realistically evaluate themselves. The authors conclude the 11 basic principles of driving psychology with an appeal for life-long driver education. Their QDC’s would provide constant updating on issues faced by all drivers and a supportive environment to encourage and initiate change.
Although cars have been around for about 100 years, driving psychology has not been incorporated into the mainstream psychology curriculum. The reason for this may be as simple as psychology’s focus on “abnormal behavior.” It is only in the last 20 years or so, that abnormal behavior of drivers has received any attention. Before that, drivers that exhibited abnormal behavior were identified as having behavioral problems in other areas of life.
The reason that it is still not addressed today may have to do with the way that psychological research is conducted. The specific behaviors associated with aggressive drivers have been studied separately in other areas of psychology, such as antisocial personality and intermittent rage disorder in abnormal psychology and memory, attention and fight or flight in cognitive psychology. It might be that psychologists feel that “road rage” can be treated under the umbrella of other disorders.
Section
C: Three Domains of Driving Behavior
The lecture “Driving Psychology
Lecture Notes For G25” found at www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/409a-g25-lecture-notes.htm
explores how driving psychology
is affected by the three domains of driving behavior. The words “three domains”
occur five times in this lecture and each incidence has a unique perspective of
driving behavior.
It follows that the primary cognitive (emotions) norms for this generation are also negative. Assessing the risk of driving is a skill that has become passé, just browse through the video’s on UTube.com and the majority of clips will highlight young men taking extreme risk of their health and life. Instead of learning from others mistakes, this generation seems bent on one-upping the last crazy stunt.
The aggressive driver rarely sees themselves as unable to judge risk. The primary sensorimotor driving norms are developed over the life-time of the driver. The first time a driver gets behind the wheel of a car, they realize that their perceptions are greatly skewed. Learning how hard to push the gas or the brake or when to start a turn is quickly learn by a new driver and a supportive driver continues to acquire new skills trough out their driving life. However, an aggressive drive will become competent in the basic driving skill and never progress. He will rely on automatized habits and excuse any lapses or errors on someone else
Section D:
Student Generational Reports on Driving Psychology
Report 2, My
Understanding of Driving Psychology, By: Derrick Stevens
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409as2006/stevens/stevens-409a-g24-report2.htm
Mr. Stevens takes us through driving
psychology as he understands it. He identifies the major principles driving
psychology, including the three-fold self, and asserts that the driver’s
personality is the “key component in developing a positive domain” that
promotes life-long learning. He promises to present his insights into how
driving psychology can influence driving behavior.
He describes the three-fold using
the analogy of riding a bike. In an incident involving a car causing a
bicyclist to fall and the ensuing emotions and actions exemplify the negative
characteristics of the three-fold self. He feels that even if the incident does
not evolve into a “road rage” event, the emotions may contribute to a later
event. The original purpose, getting to one destination, needs to be preserved
and that negative emotions impact the self impairing critical skills.
All learned behaviors are described
as having the potential for error and caution must be taken to limit
distractions in all three domains. A driver that follows the table illustrated
by Mr. Stevens should lead to a improved quality of life and that the properly
trained three fold-self should endure the most hostile and hazardous situations
Two more tables are explained, they
both involve ways to change negative behaviors into positive behaviors. The
first is a two stage plan involving identifying negative thoughts, emotions and
behaviors and a guide to changing them into positive thoughts, emotions and
behaviors. This plan takes an aggressive driver and makes them into a
supportive driver. The second table uses the Acknowledge, Witness, and Modify method
improve a driver’s behavior.
Mr. Stevens believes that a driver
is made up of many variables, mental state, environment, ability, and emotional
intelligence are just a few of the variables that he believe make up individual
drivers. He considers the newest generation of drivers to have noticeably more
cognitive and sensorimotor errors than previous generations, but claims that
these errors are learned for the prior generations. He points to our parents
and authority figures as well as the media for accepting previously
unacceptable behaviors. Changing the negative cultural norms of today is his
solution to improving driver behaviors.
Mr. Stevens performed a driver
makeover on him self. He noticed many affective, cognitive and sensorimotor
errors in himself, but felt his major error was “overextending my moral driving
values onto other drivers”. He did not trust his own objectivity to
self-witness so asked a passenger to perform the task. Then after modifying
some of his behavior he asked the same passenger to advise him while he was
driving. He felt that the experiment helped increase his understanding of his
negative habits and calm his explosive temper.
Report 2: My
Understanding of Driving Psychology, By Ashley Hooks
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409af2005/hooks/hooks-409a-g23-report2.htm
Ms. Hooks starts her report with a
review of the two text books for the class, Road
Rage and Aggressive Driving: Steering Clear of Highway Warfare by Dr. Leon
James and Dr. Diane Nahl and Driving
Lessons-Exploring Systems That Make Traffic Safer, edited by J. Peter Rothe.
Her review of the text Road Rage included
to the three sections of the book, The
Conflict Mentality, Driving Psychology and The Future of Driving. The review of Driving Lessons also included three sections, Personal Subsystems, Institutional Subsystems, and Technical
Subsystems.
A chapter form each book was closely
examination. Both selections focused on influences to driving behavior. In the Road Rage chapter children are described
as “affected by everyone around them”, the negative driving they observe
influences them to become aggressive drivers when the children grow up. The Driving Lessons chapter looks at the
impact of society on driving behaviors. First socializing while driving is
distracting for the driver, especially when the driver is young and
inexperienced. The chapter also explains how negative behavior is reinforced
among friends.
Ms. Hooks felt that both books were
useful in instruction of driving psychology. She gained an understanding of the
causes and treatments of aggressive driving and her own driving psychology that
helped her in her daily life. It influenced her to improve her driving.
In her discussion of why driving is
such a big problem, Ms. Hooks finds three reasons that she feels contribute to
making driving a dangerous enterprise. She found the fallibility of human
nature would always be a problem with no clear resolve and that our failure to
acknowledge thoughts and feelings put people at risk of improperly assessing
driving situations. The anonymity of a car and the territorial response to
other drivers makes people act on emotions that some are not even aware that
they have. She agrees with Dr. James’ call for driver education starting in
kindergarten, seeing this solution as the only viable answer to “road rage”.
Report 2: My
Understanding of Driving Psychology, by Robert Lee
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409as2005/lee/409a-g22-report2.htm
Mr. Lee begins his report with a
breakdown of tables 1, 2, 3, and 4 in the lecture notes. He defines the
affective, cognitive and sensorimotor domains of the three-fold self. He
describes himself as on the negative side of all three domains, angry, blaming
others for his mistakes and generally a reckless drive with little regard for
others.
In the process of taking the class
Mr. Lee discovered his flaws as an aggressive driver. He acknowledged his many
negative attitudes and created a plan for improvement that included empathy as
the primary motivator for change. I did not believe his sincerity in promising
to do “better” because he still held the attitude that it was others that
caused his bad moods and behavior.
I was interested in Mr. Lee’s comparison of
the two web sights http://drivers.com vs. Dr. Driving, I could tell that he had
a real passion for computers by the way he praised the non-commercial Dr.
Driving and his condemnation of the advertisements on the professional http://drivers.com. He described the articles on the
http://drivers.com web sight as “for consumers” and the articles on the Dr.
Driving web sight for educational purposes. Although he found the commercial
web sight much more organized, he preferred Dr. Driver because people could
send in questions and have them answered by professionals.
When asked describe his
understanding of the problems of driving, Mr. Lee expressed a belief that the
increase in the number of drivers was what was creating the conflict. He feels
that ignorance of our aggressive tendencies is the path to a possible solution.
Following Dr. James’ Driver Personality
Makeover will make people aware of their aggression and provide the means
for improvement.
Report 2: My
Understanding of Driving Psychology, By: Ryde Azama
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/409af2004/azama/409a-g21-report2.htm
Ms. Azama starts her report with a
comparison of the two web sights drivers.com vs. drdriving.org. She breaks her
comparison in to three general areas, content, general purpose and ranking.
Drivers.com was praise for the volume of content and the links to many
articles, including links to books on the subjects from amazon.com. She felt
the purpose for the web sight was profit and that the pedestrian driving skills
and helpful tips just a lure for potential consumers.
Dr. Driver.org receive and excellent
review on content from Ms. Azama. She felt the range of content was limited in
comparison to drivers.com but it provided more depth of information. She also
felt that this web sight presents more valid and reliable information because
of its educational purpose.
Ms. Azama cites the fatalities,
injuries and cost of damages as the proof that driving is a problem for our
society. She also includes psychological effects, lower work productivity and
passing bad habits to future generations in her ramifications of the driving
problem. She believes that Lifelong Drivers Education will improve some
drivers’ affective, cognitive and sensorimotor domains but she does not believe
that any of the ideas presented in the class will be a cure-all. People’s
inherent laziness will keep a portion of society from making any effort to
improve their driving.
Driving
Psychology: Theory and Application, By: Sarah E. Phillips
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/409as2004/phillips/report1.htm
Ms. Phillips examines the mental
process of driving psychology using the lectures, text books and her own
experiences. She begins by defining the Three-fold Self and how it is
influenced by early childhood experiences. She describes the methods used to
change the three-fold self, such as Self-witnessing methodology and Driver’s
Emotional Intelligence. Aggressive driving has become a problem in our society
and part of that is due to a Driver’s Emotional Spin Cycle and the habits that
are formed by all drivers.
Identifying driver personalities
lead Ms. Phillips to discover that her normal sanguine personality translates
to her diver personality. She attempts to avoid stress and conflict by being a
supportive driver, but she admits that there are areas of her driver
personality that could stand to be improved. Her mother’s presence in the car
causes her to consciously self-witness her behavior but she does not do this
with others in the car. She feels that the media and her peers have had little
impact on her driving. She often found that the example the media and her peers
provided was more of a deterrent to aggressive driving.
Ms. Phillips claims to have learned
a great deal in this class about the psychology of driving and her own driving
psychology, but it seems to me that she has not improved to the stage of
feeling happy while driving. Her solution to stressful situations, like traffic
or inconsiderate drivers, is to avoid the situation. If she had truly embraced
the Driver Personality Makeover, she would try to empathize with bad drivers
and bad driving situations in order to lessen the stress she feels.
Conclusions
I found this part of the report
extremely difficult because so much of the prior generational reports included
reviews of more prior generational reports. This creates a situation where I
have to review a review of a review. It was also difficult because the prior
generational reports included little of their own opinions, which left me unable
to compare attitudes and solutions. I was left with accessing the understanding
of basic principles of driving psychology and for the most part, all five
students were able to regurgitate the teachings of the lectures and the
text.
Section E: My Driving Personality Makeover Field Experiment
Introduction
I was recently in a parking garage that overlooks a major downtown street. I heard the siren of an oncoming emergency vehicle. I did not know if the vehicle was a police car, fire truck or an ambulance but I wondered how the people in their cars would react and if I might infer what kind of driver I was watching by their reactions to the emergency vehicle entering their path.
I was surprised to discover that it was painfully obvious which drivers were supportive and which drivers were aggressive. The supportive drivers immediately pulled to the curb of the road and stopped when they heard the siren, in some cases these drivers had pulled over before the ambulance became visible. They chose to pull over on the chance that they might be in the path of an emergency vehicle. The aggressive drivers pulled around the supportive drivers, entering the space that the ambulance would need to pass through the busy street. These aggressive drivers possessed their territory until the last possible second with out care for the ambulance’s need to slow down. They also were the first pull in behind the ambulance, cutting off the supportive drivers from regaining the road.
I decided that the aggressive attitude towards emergency vehicles would be an excellent candidate for this section of the paper. I wanted to find one of my friends that was a self-reported aggressive driver and admitted to hovering in the path of emergency vehicles and apply the “Driving Personality Makeover” to just this one area of aggression. My thought was that the interaction between an aggressive driver and an emergency vehicle was sufficiently emotional to evoke empathy in an aggressive driver. My theory is that if an aggressive driver can change his affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor domains in response to emergency vehicles then he might be more likely to change them in the other areas of driving.
The Method
The Results
|
Oppositional
driving style: Bob’s 1st interview |
Supportive driving
style: suggested for Bob |
|
“I hate emergency vehicles, they just tie up traffic.” |
“I don’t want to be in traffic any longer than I have to be but someone’s life may depend on me getting out of the way.” |
|
“The people that pull over early are a pain the ass. They cause me to have to pull around them.” |
“The people that pull over early are obeying the law and helping the emergency vehicles makes it through traffic faster. I should do the same” |
|
“Waiting till the last possible moment to pull over is just a smart strategy, especially if other drivers have not left room for me to pull in. I can pull up close to them but keep rolling while the emergency vehicle passes.” |
“Waiting till the last moment might let me pass a few cars but I don’t want to run the risk of not being able to get out of the way. That would cause the emergency vehicle to slow down to avoid me and possibly hit me.” |
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“After the emergency vehicle passes, I get in behind it and pass everyone else. That is the only good part of it” |
“I really want to make up the time I lost but all the cars should enter the lane in their turn. That is only fair.” |
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“After the emergency vehicle passes, there is always traffic back-up. This makes me angry and impatient.” |
“I know that after the emergency vehicle passes there will be a short period of traffic slow down, but it is not as bad as what the person in the ambulance is going through.” |
I explained to Bob that if he experiences the feelings and actions we discussed that he should use the “Acting As If” method. He show say to himself or out loud the supportive driver responses we discussed.
The basic rule of the road when an ambulance approaches from the rear is for drivers to pull over to the right side of the road. They should not slam on their brakes or, just as bad, follow in the wake of the emergency vehicle, said Donnie Gates, assistant chief of operations for the city's Emergency Medical Services Division.
"The ambulance is supposed to approach from the left lane and all traffic is supposed to move to the right hand side," he said. "If there is no way that you can pull to the right -- if traffic is so congested that you can't pull toward the right -- just come to a safe stop."
Gates said ambulance drivers are told to keep a safe distance from the car ahead of them "because you never know what they're going to do. Sometimes they'll stop right in front of you."
Drivers, meanwhile, should signal what their intentions are, "so that the emergency vehicle operator will know exactly what you're going to do," he said, " and then move as far to the right as you can."
Under no circumstances should a motorist follow an ambulance.
"Especially during rush hour traffic, a lot of people will jump in behind an ambulance or fire truck to follow them in so they get a clear lane," Gates said. "That is one of the most dangerous things for a driver to do."
The ambulance driver may suddenly have to "hit the brakes" or possibly go through a red light, he warned.
The problem emergency vehicle drivers see more and more, Gates noted, are motorists insulated in their vehicles -- their windows rolled up tight, air-conditioning going and radio or CD player playing full blast.
"A lot of times, (they) can't hear an ambulance," he said. He advises being more visually aware of what's going on, including checking frequently in the rear-view mirror.
5. Bob left with a copy of the Inner Power Tool: Acting As If table we created and a copy of the basic rules of the road for handling emergency vehicles. He agreed to think about what we had discussed and to read the table and article once or twice in the next couple of days. We agreed to meet three day from our first meeting
6. At our next meeting, I ask for Bob for any insights he had in the days since we last talked. He said that he had left the table and the article in his car and every time he got in the car he would glance over them. He was surprise how much it had made him think about his driving habits and not only the ones associated with emergency vehicles. He did not encounter an emergency vehicle in the intervening time but he thought that if he had he would have handled it “much better than the old me”.
7. I asked Bob if he acknowledged that he was an aggressive driver and that not only was it dangerous to himself but that it may be dangerous to others. He had acknowledged himself as an aggressive driver in our first meeting but had shrugged off any suggestion that his aggression may be dangerous to himself or others. During this interview he was much more willing to accept responsibility for the danger he was creating.
I asked Bob to envision an ambulance coming up behind him. I told him that the person in the ambulance was having a major heart attack and that he and all the drivers on the road performed as they are supposed to. They all pulled to the right and the ambulance passed without having to slow or stop. The ambulance arrived at the hospital and the person was saved. I ask Bob to tell me how this made him feel. He said that it felt like he played a small part in saving that persons life. I explained how to create the same scenario for any emergency vehicle and asked him to think of the scenario whenever he was in the actual situation.
8. Bob identified a few bad habits that he discovered he had from reading the article. The first was that he was not aware that he was supposed to go to the right; he thought that he was just supposed to get out of the way. Second, that he often played his stereo so loud that he did not hear a siren till it was very close. Last, he had never considered the danger of following an emergency vehicle. We discussed strategies for repairing the bad habits. He provided all the strategies and I refined them. Awareness of the habits seemed to major deterrent to repeating the habit.
9. I explained to Bob that driving could be a pleasant experience and that the anger responses that he has are literally wearing his body out fast than normal. I explained that most of the anger he feels when driving is a habit he has formed over a life-time and that he can control it as simply as we had controlled his response to emergency vehicles. I also told him to be proud of the help he was giving to the public and that his contribution could really make a difference in someone’s life. I left him with the strategies for changing his bad habits and we agreed to meet again in a week.
10. At our final meeting, Bob was very animated. He had actually been in the emergency vehicle situation and had performed as a supportive driver. His music was playing a little lower so he was able to hear the siren earlier and he was able to moved to the right and slowly come to a stop. He did not pull in behind the vehicle but waited his turn to regain the road. He said that he felt good about helping someone else, but that he became angry at other drivers that exhibiting his old style of aggressive driving. We discussed ways to empathize with them and to reduce anger. Bob was now asking for information on fixing other areas of aggressive driving. He said that he did not want to be angry while driving anymore. I promised to share Dr. James’ book with him as soon as my class was over.
Conclusions
I am very pleased with my experiment and a little surprised. I have known Bob for a while and only approached him because I knew that I would be able to talk him into participating. I did not believe that he would take the experiment seriously, nor did I believe that he would actually change. I was wrong on both counts. Being unaware of the dangers that his aggressive driving posed to others allowed him to continue his bad habits and, in some cases, defend his bad choices.
I think that the biggest change for Bob was the knowledge that he could enjoy driving. That he could feel good and proud of the decisions he made while driving. His interest in continuing to improve his aggressive driving style makes it clear that this method of applying the “Driver Personality Makeover” to one area of driving might make an aggressive driver more likely to continue improving other areas of driving.
Section F: Advice to Future Generations
Driving psychology has been an incredibly interesting subject to study. It is the first time, since I chose this major, which all the different disciplines of my classes have merged into a topic that can be viewed from many angles. It has challenged me to use the knowledge that I have acquired thus far in my academic career. I am now able to identify aggressive and supportive drivers, make a plan for changing an aggressive driver into a supportive driver, and I can back up my knowledge with statistics and studies that validate my knowledge. I think that the most important thing that I will take away from this class is the determination to be a foot soldier in Dr. James’ war on “road rage.”
I am able to distinguish negative affective thoughts in my own head and have the tools to examine them and replace them with more positive ones. I no longer generalize racist, gender, or age biases to all drivers I meet on the road. I try visualizing a situation that I might behave in a similar manner. I no longer resist changing my behaviors because I have learned that it is easy and gratifying to move my thoughts in a more positive direction.
The only modification that I would make to the concepts learned in this course would be to simplify the tools used to identify and treat aggressive drivers. This course is a psychology course and for the student it is important to learn all of the psychological inner workings of an aggressive driver, but the typical driver is going to be overwhelmed by the depth of learning. In order to engage the typical driver, a step-by-step identification of the two stages of the three domains would need to be implemented.
For the next generations that take this class, I say that you need to be very organized in this class. There is not one assignment in this class that can be completed in one night of cramming. The internet plays an integral part of this class and all assignments are posted there. If you are not knowledgeable about creating web pages, I would advise you to find someone in the class to help you. Presenting you work in a web format and making sure that your links are correct and active will be large portion of your grade.
Dr. James’ instructions for writing and presenting your work are clear and easily followed if you take the time to read the instructions several times and are good at paying attention to details. He does not lay the instruction out in a 1-2-3 format, his lessons are through out his web page and require the student remember what was instructed in earlier assignments and build on that learning. The student that is self-motivated and enjoys learning at their own pace will be well satisfied by this course and the student that needs structure and guidance will find this class difficult.
Section G: Links
The road rage epidemic: hype or reality? (1997), found online at: http://www.drivers.com/article/168/
‘Road rage’ gets a medical diagnosis (2006), found online at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13152708/
Aggression, (2006) NYS Department of Motor Vehicles. Governor's Traffic Safety Committee. Found online at: http://www.nysgtsc.state.ny.us/aggr-ndx.htm
My Home Page: http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409af2006/atkinson/atkinson-home.htm
G25 Class Home Page: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/classhome-g25.htm