Report
3
My
Proposal for Lifelong Driver Education
By: Jeremy Kubo
1. Preface
In Report
2, we each had to first recognize what our driving style and philosophy is. Upon doing so, we would than have to acknowledge
what areas in our driving that we would have to improve on. Finally, we designed an experiment that
would help us to make ourselves better and safer drivers, thus creating and
helping add to a healthier driving environment. This was the purpose of that report. We took different tests and questionnaires, which aided in
determining how we, and others, saw us as drivers. And, like always, we turned to past generations for ideas, inspiration
and assistance on that journey of our own driving personality makeover. Upon
completion of report 1, I came to the conclusion that I was a bad driver. There were numerous areas in which I needed
to improve on. I realized how important
it was for me to take other people’s criticisms constructively and not hurtfully. By designing my own experiment to work on
the areas that made me a bad driver, I became more aware of my emotions,
thoughts and actions while on the road.
For more information, please check out Report 2.
The
purpose of this report (report 3) is to be able to understand the importance of
lifelong driver education and how to help implement a solution to continue this
type of education for people of all ages from infancy to old age. By the end of this report, I will have
created my own proposal of how to help this concept of lifelong driver
education continue on for everyone.
2. Introduction
Our
text, Road Rage and Aggressive Driving, by Dr Leon James and Dr. Diane
Nahl, has a chapter called Lifelong Driver Education. In this chapter (chapter 9), the authors discuss how important
lifelong driver education is. They feel
there would be a great reduction in car accidents and road rage if this concept
was implemented early on in life and continued on to elderly age. Teenagers are the most at risk. They are not only inexperienced in handling fatal
situations, but they are the ones who would most allow themselves to be
involved in risky behaviors. They think
they are invincible and they allow themselves to act on that behind the
wheel. The driver-ZED program was
introduced to teach appropriate risk management. It’s an interactive CD created by the AAA Foundation for Traffic
Safety. James and Nahl discuses Dr.
Larson’s (consultant for driver-ZED) beliefs on how to cure aggressive driving
by eliminating faulty beliefs. James
and Nahl believe motivation and responsibility are the essence of affective
driver education. They believe in a
driving psychology curriculum that is worked in to the K-12 school system. Upon completion of the K-12 curriculum, a
person continues their training through QDCs (Quality Driving Circles). The video course, Roadrageous, co-authored
with road rage therapist, Dr. Arnold Nerenberg, teaches the three-step driver
self-improvement program. The chapter
ends with a section on elderly being at risk also. This is compared to the teens being at risk.
One
passage I found to be of interest from chapter 9 in Dr. James and Dr. Nahl’s
book, Road Rage and Aggressive Driving is found on page 195. “This focus on the importance of values looks
toward a new philosophy of driving that is community oriented rather than
individual centered.” I think it is vital
to realize the significance of other people’s thoughts, feelings and actions
when it comes to the driving world. We
can’t just be looking out for ourselves when we are out there on the road. We need to be aware not only of our own
personality but our neighboring motorists as well. We need to help each other in becoming safer and better
drivers. We need to help each other
recognize our faults and work together for a solution to improve on it. By this, we will not only be helping someone
else, but ourselves as well, and other people around us. We will be aiding in creating a perfect
driving environment of serenity—a world with fewer accidents, which will hopefully
one day be a world of no accidents.
Another
passage that intrigued me in Road Rage and Aggressive Driving by Dr.
James and Dr. Nahl’s chapter 9 is found on page 196, “the entire personality of
the individual is involved in driving”.
Through this book, we have learned about the driver’s threefold
self. The three basic aspects of personality
include, affective, cognitive and sensorimotor. The affective self involves “the driver’s feelings, emotions,
attitudes and values”. The cognitive
self involves “the driver’s thoughts, judgment and knowledge”. The sensorimotor self involves “the driver’s
vision, motor reactions, fatigue, stress and pain”. I think it is fascinating and amazing how our personality truly
shines when we are behind the wheel.
What fascinates me even more than that is someone who suffers from the
jekyll-hyde syndrome. You think you
know someone and all of a sudden, it’s like multiple personality disorder. Who is this person behind the wheel? It is so true that each part of our
personality is seen through everything we do while driving—our feelings,
thoughts and actions. It’s like a part
of you is dying to come out and show the world… this is who you are.
Lastly,
the passage found on page 208 from chapter 9 in the book, Road Rage and
Aggressive Driving, by Dr. James and Dr. Nahl, is one that surely gave me a
pause to think about. “New drivers who
are elderly and female have a double handicap to overcome in the eyes of
society and the motorists on the road: They need to learn how to manage people’s
hostility toward both older drivers and female drivers. They especially need to learn to monitor
their driving in relation to other motorists.”
It’s interesting and yet so true.
I would hate to be a elderly female driver just beginning to drive. It’s amazing how many stereotypes are out
there for this certain groups of people.
There’s a whole propaganda of things said about female drivers alone and
things said about elderly people alone—but to put the two together. Wow.
What an eye-opener. It’s
difficult I’m sure to be a person in that specific group. There are so many drivers who have it in
their head that these people just cannot drive and they should be banned from
the road. I know myself at times am
quite horrible when I see female drivers or elderly drivers on the road. Sometimes, I just don’t think and it’s just
an automatic, “well, no wonder, it had to of been a female driving”. It’s not fair to make these people to have
to learn to handle other’s hostility.
There shouldn’t be hostility there in the first place. And I admit I am one of the victimizers.
While
I was looking through past generations, I came across Rich Snider of generation
17. He reviewed the book, Road Rage
and Aggressive Driving. His review
mentioned the QDCs – Quality Driving Circles.
He feels QDCs can improve the roadways and save a lot of lives. He sees the importance of continued training
and lifelong driver education. I also
came across S. Arzadon’s review
from generation 18. This person talks
about graduating licensing approach. She
likes the idea and feels it will be of good use, especially here in
Hawaii. She recognizes the necessity
for something to be done to continue driver education for a longer period. Finally, I found Shane Nishimoto’s report
from generation 13. His report wasn’t a
review of the book, but rather it was a report on QDCs. I found his comments to be quite
interesting. He can see himself as a
messenger for QDCs and has strong hopes for the future as it could spread from
one island to another to the mainland to rest of the country and other
countries eventually as well. He thinks
it would be good for people to notice how useful QDCs could be and stresses the
effectiveness all lies in the hands of the individuals.
I
thought it was pretty interesting as to how QDC was mentioned much more than
Lifelong Driver Education itself.
Although QDC is a big part, I believe, of Lifelong Driver Education, it
makes me wonder if the people who did review the book didn’t quite see the true
importance of this profound movement. I
didn’t see many comments about the K-12 curriculum, which I think plays a huge
role in lifelong driver education. It
should in fact start from when we are born because that is when we are first
exposed to the driving world. We may
not be behind the wheel, but we are surely a passenger on the road to a
lifelong education. From what I noticed,
it seemed for the book reviews for generation 17, the people were suppose to
pick out what they felt were the most important concepts or topics of the
entire book. Not many even touched the
subject of chapter 9, the lifelong driver education. I believe they didn’t probably because they were stressed more on
the importance of the driver’s threefold self and the three-step driver
self-improvement program and the whole issue of emotional intelligence. Though, I do believe every single person who
takes this course realizes the constant and never-ending stand Dr. James and
Dr. Nahl have, that driving education and all its components are essential for
a safer and better driving environment and through that, education must be
continued. But no one really comes
straight out by saying it.
3. Class Discussions and Lecture Notes
The
first class presentation I wanted to discuss is Mark Corpuz on February 1, 2004
about Chapter 2: Aggressive Driving and Mental Health. I agreed with why driving arouses
anger. I agreed with this part of his
presentation because anger is closely linked to aggression and I can see this
in our class discussions when people talk about their experiences of how they
get angry when they are cut off and feel the need to get revenge. I also agreed with the part about gender
effect. He stated that men experience more
negative feelings than women behind the wheel.
I agree with that because I read an article for my family resources class
that said adolescent males are more likely to partake in aggressive driving. I disagreed with a couple of his ideas. One was drivers behaving badly on TV. I disagree that TV influences our
behaviors/actions. I think the TV influences
the way we see things. Another idea I disagreed
with was players behaving badly with road rage video games. Like the previous idea, I don’t think that
the video games cause violence. I think
that the video games, to a certain extent, can change how we see things. For example, we may not see an accident the
same way if we keep seeing it over and over again.
The
second class presentation I wanted to discuss is Christine Oishi on March 15,
2004 about Chapter 7: Children and Road Rage.
I agree with her concept of road rage nursery. Children do tend to take on the traits of their parents. And if children witness their parents
expressing road rage, they may tend to pick up the habit also. I also agree on the concept of CARR
(children against road rage). I think
it is an important program. Teaching
children at a young age is important to stop aggressive driving and road
rage. I disagreed with the rewards for
good passengers concept because even though kids learn better in a positive
environment, if the parent is just acting, than the reward is meaningless. I also disagreed with the concept about
children’s road rage. I don’t think her
example was good because it is not always children that walk across streets
slowly or horseplay around the sidewalks. So drivers may be showing road rage not just to adults but
children as well.
The
third presentation I wanted to discuss is Hiroko Kikuchi on April 5, 2004 on Chapter
9: Lifelong Driver Education. I agree
with the concept she discussed about teenagers at risk because teens sometimes
don’t have good judgment when they first learn to drive, which leads to a lot
of accidents. Another concept I agreed
with is Post_Licensing: The QDC Approach.
I agreed with this because I think it is a good way to promote lifelong
driver education. I disagreed with the
Roadrageous Video Course in regards to her psychological aspect because I think
that drivers are aware when they are in bad moods and are just
overreacting. They just can’t admit it
to themselves. I also disagreed with
older drivers at risk because I don’t think that elderly people should make
adjustments. I just think that they
shouldn’t even be driving, period.
For
the three passages from our text, Road Rage and Aggressive Driving, that
I mentioned in my introduction, I felt were quite noteworthy for me. The first passage, about the importance of values
leading toward a new philosophy of driving that is community oriented versus
individual centered is striking because it’s essential to have others helping
you along to be a better driver. It’s
hard to do it on your own. With the
support and criticisms of others, the roads will become safer. The second passage about the “entire personality
of the individual is involved in driving” (196), was worth mentioning because I
believe that was the whole essence of this course—to recognize the threefold
self. This is what makes us who we, are
behind a wheel or not. Our affective,
cognitive and sensorimotor self is clearly seen in driving. The third passage I chose, about new drivers
who are both a woman and elderly have a double handicap in the eyes of society
and other drivers. This, I believe, is
quite noteworthy because of the many stereotypes it brings up with just women
alone and just elderly alone. People
see weak and they take it to the worst level faulting others who they believe
can’t stand up for themselves.
4. My Proposal for Lifelong Driver Education
My
proposal for lifelong driver education would be categorized into four groups—
-infancy
through elementary (age 0 – 12)
-intermediate (age 13 – 14)
-high school (age 15 – 18)
-post-high school (age 18+)
During
this first phase from infancy to 6th grade, children aren’t the ones
driving, but rather are the passengers.
This is where the affective (feelings, emotions, attitudes and values)
self plays the biggest role. This stage
focuses on children recognizing how their parents or caregivers are
driving. It is important to stress the
consequences of specific situations involving feelings. This is the time when children are
interacting with other children. They
may get into fights. They may begin
experiencing selfishness and hostility and aggressiveness. It should be taught at this early age the ideas
of sharing (for future sharing the road), peacefulness (for future remaining
calm if someone were to cut you off on the road), being able to sacrifice (for
future slowing down so another motorist can get in). It is essential to realize children are very observant. They pick up easily on aggressiveness. It is vital to begin the education here that
driving should be an enjoyable experience, not a horrifying one.
In
my second phase from 7th – 8th grade, the cognitive (thoughts,
judgment and knowledge) self plays the biggest role. I think at this point, the child’s mind is at a developed phase
where they can accurately tell right from wrong, where the brain is being used
to make rational decisions. At this
short phase, the cognitive self can be introduced with situations that are occurring
currently. Analyze why a certain crash
happened. Who was at fault? What should the driver have been doing
instead? What consequences took place
because of the careless action? Let the
children explore in small groups what actually happened and why it happened. They can also incorporate what they learned
about their affective education in the first phase. What was going on before the crash occurred? What were they feeling? How do they feel discussing the whole issue
in general? What could have been done differently? By this stage, these children are getting
prepared for driving themselves. They
know they are only a few years from being behind the wheel and they are excited
about it. Self-witnessing could be a
good approach used at this phase. By
recording what’s going on in the car as a passenger and by reviewing and analyzing
it later to see what problems arose if
any and applying their cognitive self to see what could have been done
differently and what feelings came up and what was the underlying cause of it.
In
the third phase, which covers 9th-12th grade, the
sensorimotor (vision, motor reactions, fatigue, stress and pain) self can then
be introduced. By now, people at this
stage will actually begin being on the road.
Through simulations, one can experience situations where they will have
to make sensorimotor decisions and hopefully at this point, their affective and
cognitive self is so strong they will be able to make the right action. It is important to probably implement the
three-step self-improvement program at this point so one can acknowledge,
witness and modify their actions, rationalize and express themselves.
In
the final stage from after high school until forever, I believe QDCs are
essential. At this point, everything is
voluntary. Hopefully, with all the
training each person has had from when they were first born, they will want to
continue their education. They will
want to work with others in helping create a safer environment to drive
in. This will help in keeping up with
good driving skills and there will always be someone watching out for you to
let you know when you’re slipping. It’s
a nice confidant boost to know someone has always got your back and will
continue on with you for lifelong driver education. This day and age with the wonderful world of technology and the
internet, forming a QDC online would be an idea. With everybody being so busy too, they can come online whenever
they’re free and comfortable and just discuss how their driving was that day
with whoever is available, or maybe have a forum of some sort where you can
leave posts and messages.
Hopefully
this proposal would get people to realize the importance of lifelong driver
education and the necessity of it. I hope
one day something like this could be implemented, so that one day the roads
will be a safe place to be. I’m sure it
would involve legislation, the public’s help and parents and our own community
to get the proposal to be implemented.
It’s not going to be something easy, but it sure is something that will
be worthwhile in the end.
5. Conclusion
There
are definite social and cultural attitudes in our society when it comes to
driving. Like I mentioned before, it is
hard for women and elderly people to be out there in the real world of
driving. They are constantly ridiculed
for their driving skills or lack there of, as some people see it. This was something I had already noticed
before doing this assignment, but what it did help me in identifying is how
often it occurs and why it’s occurring.
Some people need to find blame and enjoy putting it on others rather
than owning up to it themselves. In
certain people’s eyes, women are the weaker sex and the elderly are the weakest
age group. It’s easy to pinpoint
mistakes and screw-ups on people who are seen as weak, but the ones who are
really the weakest is the ones who’s pointing the fingers. It is the ones who fall so easily into
believing all the stereotypes.
I
believe my new awareness is very useful in helping to end this war of rage on
the roads. If people are aware and
people are willing, the roads would be much safer. There will be fewer accidents. Road rage will cease to exist.
I think if everyone would try to get involved in QDCs, it would be a
better environment to drive in. Some
people might look at it like school, and once they hear that word, might not want
to be involved, but people need to be educated about the advantages and the fun
you could make out of it. So it won’t
be a dreadful experience, but rather an enjoyable one.
My
views changed significantly from the beginning of the semester until now. I never imagined a world of calmness on the
roads. I always saw the roads as a
place where young people find thrills in racing on, where middle-aged people
used to get from point A to point B.
Now I see a different view—a road where there are no lane hopping, no
swearing, no tailgating, no speeding.
It almost seems impossible. In
fact, in the beginning, it did seem impossible to me. How could this ever be something likely to happen? Now I can see it. But, I believe it will only work if there are those out there who
want the same thing too. They have to
be convinced that it could be possible and that it is something essential for
our own healthy well-being.
Driving
behavior I’m not sure will change too much over the next few years. Right now, it seems a little unpredictable. It’s hard to say. Recently, there have been so many accidents involving cars and
motorcycles and it seems to be at a rise at this point. But, hopefully, with these accidents come
the realization for the need to be cautious and those numbers will come
down. I think if driving psychology were
implemented more into education, there would be a significant decrease in
accidents in the near future. However,
how likely that is to happen, I’m not sure.
It all depends on the individuals themselves to help spread the
word. It would be nice to drive home
and not be tailgated or honked at or feeling anger when it happens causing me
to act out my anger by giving the finger.
But, I don’t really think this is something that I can predict.
6. Future Generations
Again,
to my future generations, don’t give up.
Allow yourself to really go deep when you explore the world of driving
psychology. Take advantage of the earlier
generations before your time. Just
because the first person you come across doesn’t have exactly what you were
looking for or is on a completely different level of thinking from you, it doesn’t
mean there aren’t others in the past generations that do have the same ideas as
you, that they are on the same wavelength.
Trust in yourself and trust in your fellow generations who lied before
you. Don’t rush and just try to picture
a perfect driving world, try to imagine how great it would feel to know you
were a part of helping that perfect driving environment come to be.