My First Non-Oral Outline

Aggressive Driving and Mental Health

Road Rage and Aggressive Driving: Steering Clear of Highway Warfare, Dr. Leon James and Dr. Diane Nahl, Published by Prometheus Books, 2000, p. 57-66.

By Robert Lee

I. Gender Effect

a. Men

i. Respond more rage, impatience, danger, and violence when feeling negative emotions behind the wheel.

ii. Men report aggressive driving more than women do.

iii. Men drive more aggressively than women and manifest road rage symptoms more routinely.

b. Women

i. Experience more positive emotions while driving more than men do.

ii. Women are more compassionate towards other drivers.

iii. There are a growing number of women aggressive drivers.

c. Men vs. Women

i. Women are starting to become aggressive drivers, because there are more women in the work place now, which means that there are more women on the road.

1. Women are stuck in the same congested traffic as men do, because there are more in the work force.

2. Women also have to make more stops than men, because they do errands, pick up kids, banking, and etc.

ii. Young women are now close to inexperienced young men, auto-insurance wise, who are being charged 18% above base rate.

iii. Although men are still more likely to be involved in aggressive driving accidents more than women, the numbers of women involved in these kinds of accidents are increasing.

II. Driving Impaired

a. Physical Impairments

i. Driving impaired is a result from physical and emotional factors that contribute to driving aggressively.

ii. Some common factors are: fatigue, chemical substance, and strong emotions

iii. Driving involves the coordination of body movements and mental judgments

b. Emotional Impairments

i. .Emotional impairments are more difficult to manage because they arise without warning.

ii. Health professionals generally attribute driving with stress factors causing higher blood pressure.

iii. According to the book enclosed automobiles provide a sense of anonymity, which facilitates aggressive behavior.

III. Emotional Self-Control Behind the Wheel

a. Self-appraisal

i. Skill depending on how carefully we monitor our emotions and how we express them.

b. Self-regulation

i. Skill depending on acquiring methods to self-regulate the intensity and expression of our emotions.

c. How to develop emotional competence

i. You need to know the basic understanding of mental control.

ii. Be aware of your emotions.

iii. Negative emotions encourage negative, judgmental, and self serving thoughts.

IV. 3 Mental control techniques

a. Postpone the immediate satisfaction you intensely desire.

b. Avoid savoring the victory and the pleasurable anticipation of punishing and taking revenge.

c. Redirect negative scenarios of justification that give you permission to engage in hostile acts.

Helpful Websites:

http://www.drivers.com/topic/36/

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=8935919&dopt=Abstract

http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/459s98/hattori/report1.html

My homepage: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/409as2005/lee/home.htm