A Review of
Dr. Leon James and Dr. Diane Nahl, Road Rage & Aggressive Driving; Steering Clear of Highway Warfare, Prometheus Books, 2000
by Korey Molyneaux, March 17 2002
This Book is composed of Twelve chapters that are divided into three sections. I will discuss in this book review the different chapters, what I found helpful in life and psychology, and what I have learned from this book. Below is my review on the ideas and concepts brought forth in reading, Road Rage & Aggressive Driving; Steering Clear of Highway Warfare.
Main Topics of This Book
Section 1 of 3 This section covers chapters 1-4 and discusses the concepts of an individuals intellectual capacity when faced with the functioning of mutually exclusive impulses, desires and tendencies.
Chapter 1 ~ A Cultural Look into the Concept of Rage in driving / life arenas; How anger is not a triggered emotion, but a learned habit. Road rage and aggressive driving is a world wide problem that finds it's roots in cultural ideas.
Chapter 2 ~ The Socialization of anger and how it effect driving abilities and mind states. This chapter examines the role of television and other factors of socialization of rage. Studies reveal that the ability to use violence is a culturally learned habit. Often violence is practiced through the use of video games and fantasies, this weakens the inhibitions that work against acting out in violence.
Chapter 3 ~ Defensive driving and high stress factors may increase chances to experience or be victimized by rage on the road ways. Driving defensively may cause harm rather than help in the life arena of driving. It establishes a negative bias about the world and others which place an individual in the negative about others/ world life arena. Stresses such as peer pressure and congestion can lead to situations of road rage that often result with feelings of enmity.
Chapter 4 ~ There are different types of drivers on the road with individual road rage tendencies, each type is presented with specific types of emotional challenges. Rationalization of road rage and cruel fantasies allow people to accelerate their anger and justify their behaviors. This justification can lead to disturbing behaviors and acts of rage.
Section 2 of 3 This section discusses the emotional and behavioral characteristics of drivers; How they can improve their driving behaviors, and prevent future socialization of road rage.
Chapter 5 ~ Every individual has the ability to change themselves and to feel better, through emotional intelligent thinking individuals can learn to choose a response other than the "fight or flight" response. This chapter focuses on the levels of emotional intelligence and how we change our feelings of opposition to feelings of support. The tools needed to change are found with in, learning to use the inner tools takes time and practice.
Chapter 6 ~ Acknowledging, Witnessing and Modifying are the three steps to changing the mental state and developing better emotional strength on the road. This means that the individual must acknowledge that every driver needs emotional education, the individual must be able to actually witness their behavior, and that the individual must be ready to modify the behaviors they want to change.
Chapter 7 ~ Birth is the beginning of the socialization of rage; Children are very effected by the observations they make from their aggressive parents and peers. Sadly the road rage tradition is passed on, children absorb the norms in their environment. Children begin to fantasize about road rage many years before they are able to drive, these fantasies are lived through the aggressive drivers they ride with. It is possible to not socialize road rage to children, but first parents must learn to acknowledge the problem and change their ways.
Chapter 8 ~ Supportive driving is to view others through the use of wisdom, compassion and tolerance; Learning to challenge our natural tendency to defend ourselves. The idea here is to maintain a healthy, positive emotional spin cycle because sympathy brings about empathy and understanding. This allows individuals to develop better understandings of themselves and others. The idea is to learn how to fight the norm of negativity and to use inner power tools to act out in a prosocial manner.
Chapter 9 ~ Learning to drive should be more than a short course, taken in the teenage years to obtain a license. To promote safety on the roads driver education should begin at kindergarten and extend into high school. Although driver education should be a never ending process because there are always new obstacles that the public must be aware of and learn to deal with. Quality Driving Circles (QDC) can be a supportive way for individuals to help and support one another to follow self improvement programs.
Section 3 of 3 This section faces the harsh reality that although many are opting to change attitudes and behaviors of road rage, it is hard in this day and age with all the demands and daily challenges people are trying to accomplish. The car is a place where we do many things along with driving in order to save time, these behaviors can be distracting and very dangerous.
Chapter 10 ~ Aggressive driving leads to hundreds of thousands of fatalities, millions of injuries and billions of dollars, the sad truth is much of this is preventable. People are fighting to end this socially supported idea of road rage; Legislators of all branches are instating sever penalties for acts of road rage, and police incentives are being offered. Stamping out acts of rage is being practiced across the country through education, driving bills and community participation.
Chapter 11 ~ Many individuals feel the need to resist authority and convention especially when it comes to driving, especially when concerning roadway speed. The road rage culture supports cynical beliefs toward officials and agencies that make regulations, the "ragers" feel that no one should be able to tell them how to drive. This idea is very manifested in the concept of speed limits.
Chapter 12 ~ There are great distractions while driving in these times of incredible technology and conveniences. Individuals spend a great deal of time in their cars and try to accomplish many tasks while driving; eating, talking on cell phones and using portable computing systems. These distractions make the road a dangerous place to be. But we can not stop technology, so we must learn how to multitask in a safe way through training. This will help us to interact with other drivers on the road in a safe and positive manner, not limiting us to the inner (separate) world within our car.
Road Rage : Public Concerns & The Medias Influence
The topics discussed in this book are important in societies all around the world today. Driving has become a necessary, daily procedure for many individuals and while hundreds of mini-exchanges are experienced on the road some are bound to be hostile. The authors have presented road rage as a world-wide problem and are trying to get the message out that there is a solution. This message is important because societies need to break the cycle and stop the socialization of road rage to future generations while learning to reshape their own behaviors. If this message does not start reaching and changing peoples behaviors, aggressive driving is going to escalate and become even more prevalent on the roads. Road rage is a dangerous act of emotionally negative charged fantasies that are detrimental to all societies leading to injury, loss of life, chronic stress, and a weakening community.
The media plays a great role in reinforcing these negative road rage behaviors through television, movies, and video games. They present road rage as a glamorous act, making it a fun and exciting challenge, establishing a feeling of triumph through aggressive behaviors. Watching negatively aggressive behaviors where drivers are having fun and get away with the behaviors, not getting caught, only reinforces the negative behaviors. Society is also extremely influenced today by the World wide web, in doing a bit of research on www.google.com, I found that there are many pages that are anti-road rage. There were many questionnaires, stories, and self help pages to promote peaceful driving. Their were many advertisements for a hot new game called The Simpsons Road Rage, below is a shot of a scene from this video game and of the logo for the game. There were probably a hundred different links where you could purchase this game on-line.
Problems Given, Solutions Offered
| This book offers many problems that drivers must face each day, regarding themselves and others. Beginning with the overall major problem of society that this book presents, is that we are a culture of disrespect. This culture has learned negativity and anger is a normal reaction. This attitude of disrespect is also found in the workplace, in the family, and in personal relationships. |
| The solution to help our culture of disrespect is to un-learn the negative and aggressive responses. To learn to control the fight or flight response that we are socialized to act upon. |
| The problem of viewing driving as a game with a win loose situation, where the driver must keep track and asses his/her gains and losses. |
| The solution is to break these habits through the use of driving psychology tools to curb aggression in driving; pep talks, remind yourself what is really going on, and use self regulating prompts to focus on emotions of displeasure. |
| The problem of acquiring aggressive behaviors through the media by watching movies and playing video games. |
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The solution is to recognize behaviors and address them as aggressive to yourself and to others. |
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The problem of emotional high jacking; An incident where thinking is completely impaired by emotions. |
| The driver needs to reduce anger by reappraisal of the situation, recognize that there are more options than just fight or flight. It is useful to keep records, this enables the driver to modify their behavior. |
| Defensive and oppositional driving can lead to feelings of suspicion by labeling the other driver the enemy. |
| Supportive driving with training in emotional intelligence is a way to view other drives with empathy and understanding. This creates supportive driving behaviors. |
| The problem of anti-social driving. |
| The solution is to shrink your emotional territory, learn how to decrease the importance of the person or situation you are mad at. The act of pretending like something is not important to you even if you are upset is very helpful. |
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The problem of irrational, unexamined head rules. |
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The solution is to recognize these and address them in the conscious. |
| The problem of socialization of road rage to children. |
| One solution is for children to keep a journal of Drivers Behaving Badly (DDB), this a place where children can not acts of rage they observed in life or on the television. |
| The problem of passenger / driver terrorizing. |
| The solution is to design a driving partner agreement and both sign it. |
| The problem of distracting technological gadgets that are often used behind the wheel. |
| The solution would be to require that each gadget must have a training process. |
Exercises & Tests That I Found Useful
This book has many helpful tests and checklists that are beneficial to the reader when discovering their own habits and behaviors. Many of the things I have discovered about my own driving habits was through the use of the checklist and tests. Below are five examples of exercises and tests from the text:
In chapter one, page 40-42, there is a checklist called Your Road Rage Tendency. This checklist examines exactly how aggressive your driving is, and I found this to be an eye opening experience. It is a quick questionnaire with yes/no answers. Wow, I never considered myself to be an aggressive driver but my score told the truth. I have a habit of compulsive rushing, this is true because I always leave late. I have started leaving ten minutes earlier and it really decreased my stress levels on the road.
In chapter two, page 65-66, I enjoyed the checklist of Aggressive Thoughts and Feelings. This check list helps the driver to identify specific areas they need to focus on. It is helpful in bringing the unconscious negative habits to reality. I need to work on driving area 1, Fantasies of Retaliation and Revenge.
In chapter four, page 91, the checklist for Your Verbal Road Rage Tendency. Sadly I scored a 10 out of 12. I think this is an area I really need to work on. This survey is fun and shocking, it is unbelievable to see how shared these negative expressions are. This was a short exercise that questioned the reader about certain phrases that are said while behind the wheel.
In chapter six, page 134-135, I learned about Assessing Myself as a Driver. This was interesting because you have to list your 5 strongest and weakest driving traits then you have a passenger list them for you. You are able to reflect on your own perception of your driving as well as your passengers perceptions. My strongest driving trait was my ability to follow the speed limit, my weakest trait was my inability to merge on the freeway.
In chapter 8, page 184, I discovered that I am very passenger friendly. I always consider my passengers feelings, along with allowing them to influence my driving for the better. I always allow my passengers to select music and to adjust the temperature. This is just a little 10 question checklist to show the reader, How Passenger Friendly Are You?
Helpful Guides, Strengths, & Weaknesses of this Book
There are many helpful guides in Road Rage and Aggressive Driving ; A very detailed Index, helpful endnotes at the end of each chapter with a complete bibliography, and a organized table of contents. What I found most useful was the preface, the two stories show how this research and book came from a person conflict that has been troubling the authors for years. These personal reflections helped me to see that it is possible for the techniques to work, this was a major strength for the book. The book was easy to read, not extremely technical or overly filled with terminology. I could relate to many of the excerpts and had been in similar situations as other drivers, I found I could also relate with the authors.
The weakness of this book is that it does not address how unlikely that this problem will ever change. The population is growing faster than ever, people are buying more cars than they need, and everyone is driving somewhere. How do we deal with the frustration that we are always driving with empathy and many others are not. I think that after a while it would be easy to give up and join the other team, acting out in aggressive ways. If we change our habits are they apt to stick as well as a socialized anger and rage? Will they always work for individuals in real life situations? Does practice make permanent? The excerpt below is an example:
"The power of positive or prosocial emotions is enormous in its ability to free us from inherited negativity".
This incredible freedom from inherited negativity is found through positive, prosocial emotions and sounds wonderful. This concept seems like a difficult task, especially if an individual has been socialized with many anti-social beliefs. Can self regulating prompts and inner tools really destroy the years of the socialization of disrespect?
Relation to Psychology: Mental and Physical Health
Road rage interest very few people in the felid of psychology, even though cognitive psychologist, social psychologist, developmental psychologist and health psychologist should be very concerned. Cognitive psychology is very crucial in understanding road rage because of the use of schemas, emotions and stereotypes and how they effect behaviors. James and Nahl are addressing the importance road rage plays in cognitive psychology; and until we can become aware of our feelings and thoughts we will continue to take negative turns. After we become aware of our emotions we must learn to monitor and regulate them. This will lead to emotionally intelligent thinking, which reduces the amount of conflict thus resulting in lower levels of stress. Social and developmental psychologist should be concerned also in understanding road rage due to the fact that acts of rage are socially learned and accepted behaviors. Driving is filled daily with hundreds of mini exchanges making driving a social activity. Developmental psychologist should be very concerned because children are learning these acts of rage from a very early age and will continue to act upon these emotionally impaired thoughts as they have learned from their early years of life. Finally, health psychologists should also be interested because rage affects individuals health. Anger makes people sick by weakening their immune system, and for heart attack victims it increases their risk by two. The fight or flight response is a chemical response that increases adrenaline levels in the blood, this stress has a negative impact on life longevity. So by reducing the stressors in your life you can relax not only your mind but your body too. Thanks to Leon James and Diane Nahl's research road rage has now been addressed through several different areas of psychology, and hopefully others will see the importance that psychology plays in road rage.
Two of My Personal Enjoyments
These are two passages that I found particularly interesting:
| It helps to think of anger as an inner tyrant that we don't want to let out of the cage. When provoked, we are at risk of letting the fiend out, so we need to prepare better responses. (Pg 81) |
This idea was very comforting because it is very close to my own personal way of looking at myself and others. I know that deep inside is a "Korey" that is very aggressive and behaves in ways that are controlled by emotions. This person is something I keep locked up inside because I do not like the way she acts, I try to control her and keep her from showing herself. I believe that we all have this side to us, some refer to it as our true colors. I think it is more like our evil twin that we must learn to control.
| We can't always put feelings into words. We can easily become aware of the left brain activity correlated to thinking or cognitive processes, but only with difficulty and practice can we become aware of the right brain activity correlated to emotions, feelings, moods, or what's called "affective behavior". (pg 63) |
I found this interesting and wondered if people who are left brained thinkers have trouble with feelings and emotions. If so, do right brained thinkers have an easier time with labeling emotion? This is an interesting concept and I always am amazed at how complicated the functioning of the human brain is. This concept of emotionally intelligent thinking, learning to get in touch with feelings, to produce affective behavior is something that I find very useful but often struggle with.
What I Learned From Dr. James & Dr. Nahl and How it can Help Everyone
Men and Women of all ages should read this book, I feel that it can be very beneficial to all. It is important for everyone to see how this culture of rage was established and how it is being maintained. I realized that many of my own negative driving behavior have been learned from my parents and peers, I do not want to pass these horrible habits on to my children. We all need to change our habits in order to make the world a safer place to drive and to live. It has been established that road rage is a global problem and that it is getting worse. Acts of kindness are contagious, so if we could just get the ball rolling then we all would be affected by these kind acts hopefully willing to reciprocate them. We can not change the world, but we can change how we react to the world; This book is helpful in guiding people to observe and modify their own personal reactions to the world. This concept that can be applied to all areas of life, not just driving.
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