Psych 409a: October 3, 2006

How Our Health Is Affected By Aggressive Driving

By:  Kirk Ishida

Instructions for this activity are found at:

http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/g25-oral1.htm

Instructor: Dr. Leon James

Leon James and Diane Nahl (2000). Road Rage and Aggressive Driving: Steering Clear of Highway Warfare. (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books). Reviewing pages 46 to 83.

I. Aggressive Driving

a. Blames others for their actions

b. Want minimum not a maximum speed limit

c. Felt competitive while driving

d. 1/3 of all crashes and 2/3 of all fatalities are due to aggressive driving

II. Road Rage

a. A culture tantrum

i. The way we express anger whether it is sanctioned or not

ii.  The media associates readiness for violence for anger on highways

1. television

2. games

III. Driving Arousing Anger

a. Immobile ~ most of your body is not moving and tension builds

b. Restriction ~ narrow lanes means that during traffic someone will be blocking you

a. Regulation ~ imposes law which arouses rebellion

b. Lack of personal control ~ We don’t have control how fast we go

c. Being put in danger ~ Car damage is very costly

d. Territoriality ~ Our car represents our property; our self esteem

e. Diversity ~ Different driving skills

f. Multitasking ~ More distractions cause you to have more anxiety

g. Denial ~ Drivers think they are better then they are

h. Negativity ~ Hostility we see we learn from it

i. Self serving Biases ~ Blaming others for problems

j. Venting ~ letting go of anger puts us in a negative mood

k. Unpredictability ~ unknown factors causes stress

l. Isolation ~ We can’t communicate to other motorist affectively

m. Emotional challenges ~ Emotional control is not taught when we learn to drive

IV. Factors that influences Aggressive Driving

a. Socioenviornmental

b. Mental illness

c. Cultural habit factors

d. Peer Pressure

e. Vigilantism

f. Lack of responsible behaviors

g. Reduced level of traffic enforcements

V. Gender Effect

a. Males are more aggressive drivers

b. Females are becoming more aggressive drivers

i. Women fatal crashes have increased

ii. 1/3 of deaths in 2000 were females

VI. Congestion

a. $1,000,000,000  loss in productivity

b. 2,000,000,000  hours spent in traffic

c. 6,000,000,000 gallons of extra gasoline

d. 2,000,000,000 incidents of aggressive driving

e. Increase air pollution

f. Increase in number of collisions, injuries and fatalities

g. Discourages tourism and quality of life

VII. Trigger Theory

a. Anger is for a moment but attitude makes you have road rage

Link

Wisconsin Department of Transportation: http://www.dot.state.wi.us/safety/motorist/behaviors/aggressive/index.htm I used this to learn more about aggressive driving as well as information regarding the factors of aggressive driving.

American College of Emergency Physicians :

http://www.acep.org/webportal/PatientsConsumers/HealthSubjectsByTopic/MotorVehicleSafety/FactSheetAggressiveDriving.htm I found out more factors of aggressive driving as well as other basic information.

Gender and Driving:

http://www.gendercenter.org/drivingstats.htm  I found out differences about gender, statistics that gave me more information about the differenes.

My Homepage: http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409af2006/ishida/ishida-home.htm

Class Homepage: http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy25/classhome-g25.htm