Dr. James (AKA Dr. Driving), my traffic psychology professor, conceived the idea of Quality Driving Circles or QDC. According to Dr. Driving, since "driving has become intolerably stressful, dangerous, [and] demeaning", many "drivers are stressed out, threaten each other, are in a bad mood, terrorize their passangers, and often fantasize violent acts against each other." He therefore concluded that "there is a strong need for traffic psychology." In general, Dr. driving describes QDCs as small groups of drivers meet together regularly, and discuss their driving situation, influencing and learning from each other. All participants are encouraged to contribute their self-witnessing reports and tapes for common use and discussion. In other words, a QDC is group of drivers who meet regularly to discuss thire experiences on traffic related issues. These issues particularly include road rage, tailgating, and speeding.
This report discusses QDC. First, I will summarize QDC reports of previous generations (G5 and G6). This section is instrumental in completing my report. Second, I will run my own QDC. The third and forth section of this report will discuss the furture and promotion of QDC. Fifth, I will discuss the promotion of QDC to future generation of traffic psychology. The final section of this report is the Epilogue.
A. Summary: Ms. Yokoyama's report on "My Report 2: Manging a Quality Driving Circle: It's A Great Big Task, But Somebody's Gotta Do It!!", appears to be prepared thoroughly. The gist of her report falls on three aspects. First is her evaluation of two students of her choice from each of the generations 2,3, and 4. Second is her own QDC, and third is the list driving improvement resources on the Web. I found each of Ms. Yokoyama's evaluation of prior generations to be very informative. For each student, she discussed thier problems and thier methods of dealing with it. Her QDC was composed of her family and a couple of her friends. She had three sessions with the group. The section on driving resources amazed me. I never thought there could be other WebSites on driving besides Dr. Driving's.
B. Methods: Ms. Yokoyama's QDC was composed of her family and friends. Her father, mother , sister, and two close friends. She met with her group three times at 7:00 pm on Mondays. She used the first session of her QDC to explain the purpose of her report. She defined traffic Psychology and QDC, so they could understand her better. She also made clear that she is interested on their "unacceptable driving habit", and thier driving personality. She ended thier first session by making each of them critique each member's drving personality. Before she held her second session, she had to ride with each member of her QDC to further assess their driving personalities. During thier second meeting, they discussed thier newly found bad driving behavior. As expected, members of her QDC either refused or surprised to realize the result. On their third session, she made them try to change and improve thier driving habits. Furthermore, she encouraged them to continue thier self witnessing and to drive safely.
C. Evaluation: Ms. Yokoyama seemed to have a good plan for her QDC. Her strategy before her second session was great. I believe that a person's driving personality can be best assessed when seen or experienced first hand. Although I would say that the structure of her QDC is good, I believe that its success is still too soon to determine. I think that her third QDC session was only the continuation of QDC orientation. Having ran my own QDC, I know that it takes time for each member to fully understand the concept of QDC.
Summary: Dan's report is another interesting site to visite. like Ms. Yokoyama's, he evaluated and summarized earlier generaions. He seemed to have reviewed all earlier work of students from G1-G4. He also set up and managd his own QDC.
Method: In Dan's report, he took a different approach from Ms. Yokoyama. Instead of allowing the members to decide which driving problem they should focus on, he suggested to his group that they concentrate on tailgainting. It seemed to work perfectly because every participant in his QDC were familiar with the concept of tailgaiting. He made this suggestion on thier first meeting and suggested each member to do a self-witnessing report. He specifically asked them to write or record thier feelings and reason they tailgate. The second session consisted of a driving personality test. Questions for this test were taken from the Nine Zones of Drinving Personality by Dr. James. For each question, he devised a scale of 1 through 5; then rated each of his QDC member. After he evaluated the test results, he outlined a plan using Dr. James's Zones of Driving Personality. This plan is to help each of his QDC members to overcomet thier driving problems, specifically tailgating. His third and last session was devoted to discussion of driving modification. Since he gave them a plan to improve thier bad driving habit, it was time for them to discuss thier progress. Although Dan learned some changes on the driving habits of his QDC members, he realized that many of them are still reluctant to change.
Evaluation: I believe that Dan's QDC was planned well. He seemed to have covered the basic requirement of starting a QDC. He started with an assessment of the driving personality of each of his QDC members by giving them a survey. After the assessment, he outlined an individaul plan for each of his members. Finally, he had a chance to evaluate thier progress. His evaluation suggests that failure to follow the plan he made and failure to modify a bd driving habit is due to lack of motivation. Although this is likely, I believe tht the length of time spent, the frequency of each session, and the level of understanding on traffic psychology by each QDC member contributes greatly to the success of any QDC.
Mr. Chung's report on "My Report 2: Managing a Quality Driving Circle: Analyzing Your Driving Personality" discusses concepts relating to traffic Psychology. He summarized and evaluated two students of each past generations from G1-G4. He designed a driving personality test (test also found in this site) to assess road rage. Also, he discussed in detail how he statred his QDC and its results. He included several driving improvement resources found in the Web.
Methods: Firts, Mr. Chung familiarized himself with Dr. Driving's theory of traffic psychology. He was very careful about defenitions (i.e. road rage, subjective or objective attributions, facilitative driving, etc.) He also made sure that he was familiar with Dr. Driving's Philosophy that 'you should respect other drivers and focus on secial driving behaviors." He furthers that 'social driving behaviors are working together as a community where one person acan help influence another by becoming examples of healthey imdividuals. His second step was to allow his members to do a self-witnessing exenrce. then, he administered a driving personality test to asses if any of his QDC participants had road rage. He used questions from Dr. Drivings chart of nine zones of personality. Finally, his QDC was composed of his whole family: father, and two older brothers. He had three session with his QDC. The first sessin was an introduction of his report. He tried to familiarize them by answering their questions. He then gve then an assignment to monitor their driving in term of thier adherance to following the speed limit. His second session was spent with discussion on the given assignment. The third and final session was to reinforce what they all have learned.
Evaluation: Mr. Chung's QDC is on of the most thorough and well prepared report I have read. Every detail of his plan was carefully implemented. I think that his QDC members was given the best and detailed overview of what a QDC is all about. Like the first two reports, three sessions were not sufficient to assess its success. However, I believe that Mr. Chung's QDC would yield success given enough time to continue and monitored with equal enthusiasm.
In Ms. Among's report on "Rport Two: Quality Driving Circles: A General Exploration," she studied and discussed the QDC reports of three Generation 5 students. After gaining enough knowledge about QDC, she ran his own with the help of his friends. In her report, she discussed the furture of QDC, its promotion and other organizations advocating activities similar to QDC.
Method: Ms Among's QDC was composed of two individuals which were her friends. She met with them in three separate sessions. In her first session, she gave them questionares to assess what type of dreiver they were. She instructed them to conduct a self-witnessing report in preparation for their second meeting. Her second meeting was devoted to evaluation of the participant's self-witnessing reports. After the problems of each participants were identified, they met for the third time to report their progress.
Evaluation: Ms. Among's method of running her QDC is good; yet I believe that there is not much information to asses her progress. Her plan for conducting QDC is all right. Firs, the assessment of driving personality;, then, the evaluation and self-witnessing, and finally, the (I assume the ) implementation of recommendations she suggested. Perhaps, if she elaborated on each sessions, her method and progress could have been better understood. Like the other QDC reports I have evaluated, the real success of this program isa hard to determine because of the short period given to study the process.
Ms. Kinney's report on "Report #1-Quality Driving Circles-Useful or Not?" is cusses what is QDC and icluded a statistics related to driving. She has evaluated three student's report form generation 5 on QDC. After gaining enough knowledge on QDC, she set up her own with the help of three participants. In her report, she has also included other topics such as promotion of QDC, its future, other organizations supporting issues similar to QDC, and the impications of QDC on driver's education, liscensing, and insurance discounts.
Method: In Ms. Kinney's report, she had three memebers. Like the other QDC reports, she began her first session with a driving personality assesstment. Then, self-witnessing, and finally evaluation of the self-witnessing reports provided by each member. I found her added technique very interesting. When she cannot achieve the desired confession form her members, she decided to gather more information from their families. She called their parents and asked them to take notes of their children's driving habits. I used this method myself.
Evaluation: I thought the set up of her QDC was good. I especially liked the idea of calling each participant's family to gather more information, perhaps more accurate and unbiased information. Like the other QDCs set up by earlier generations, its success is too early to determine after only three meetings. Although she sounded very optomistic that her QDC participants were improving, true improvement could be measured only with more meetings.
Ms. Takahashi's report on "Report 2: Quality Driving Circles" was well prepared. Like the other students in her class, she reviewed three students report on QDC from G5. She also set up her own QDC. I found her spying technique another interesting way of getting a more accurate information about QDC participants. Unlike all the other reports I've read, she did not use a personality assessment survey. Also included in her report were future and promotion of QDC, similirar activities being done, implications of QDC, and promotion of QDC to future traffic psychology generations.
Method: Ms. Takahashi's QDC was composed of her two friends. She chose to involve them in her study because, she thought she has the advantage of knowing their driving habits. She met with them in two separate sessions. Her first session was unique from the rest of the QDC reports I've read. She explained to them the nature of her report, and because she knew them, she told them of their bad driving habits. She instructed them to do a self-witnessing report. Without her friends' knowledge, she decided to spy on them by leaving a her own tape recorder hidden in her friends car from them. The second session, she discussed with them her findings and exposed one of her friend's bad driving habit. She adviced them to continue doing their self witnessing reports to improve their driving.
Evaluation: Like Ms. Kinneys report, I found this one very interesting. I liked her initiative in finding ways to reveal her friend's bad driving habits. Although I have been arguing that the success of all of the QDC reports I have reviewed was hard to determine, I think that each QDC reports were successful in some degree. I think that the most successful accomplishment was that all QDC managers were able to point out the driving disablilities of every member and made suggestions on how to improve them. Whether any of these members comply to the suggestions made after the completion of the student's report or not, at least they were made aware that they had a problem.
The biggest task in completing this report is managing my own QDC. Ms. Kinney, a G5 student, described driving as a skill, a habit that requires constant practice. Interestingly, this puts me in a unlikely, perhaps unique situation because I do not drive, or should I say, "I don't know how to drive!" Over the years, I have collected a number of driving permits; they keep on expiring while I remained a unskilled driver. It's amazing; I'm 25 years old and I can't drive. I have thought for quite sometime what's the best way to set up my QDC. For one thing, Iwas very concerned on how can I convince people to join my QDC when I can't drive. Another is, in case I get lucky to con some people to join my group, how can I best explain to them that their future QDC manager does not know how to drive. Given the basic knowledge I gained from repeated readings of the Hawaii Driver's Manual, two and a half months of traffic psychology with Dr. Driving, readings of generational reports on QDC, and the most dreadful reality that "I had no choice" if wanted to pass this class, I must run my own QDC.
In desperation, I asked the people from my reserve unit to help me. I was hoping that since they knew that I did not know how to drive, they would not laugh at me, but they did anyway. Despite the humiliation, they agreed to help me. I had five participants in my QDC. A female and four males. All were working at the 9th Army Reserve Command at Fort DeRussy.
Session I
My first meeting with them were very informal. I just told them that I will be working on a report about quality driving circles. I explained to them what was traffic psychology and QDC. From the beginning, I had a little problem of getting them all together at one place at the same time. The only time I could meet with them was during lunch hours on weekdays. Due to the nature of their job, even if they knew I was coming, sometimes, they were just too busy to meet with me. So, I decided to see them in their office and just tell them what I wanted. I also told them that I will be giving them a driving personality survey on our next meeting.
Session II
Our second meeting was still very hard. I was not able to meet with all of them in one place at the same time. I was able to give them the survey that I prepared to assess their driving personality. I used Dr. Driving's Nine Zones of Personality to get the survey questions. I picked questions from each zones and made sure that I had both negative and positive question. Below is my survey questionare.
Part I. Please put an X before each statement that you agree upon. Patr II. Please answere the following as "honestly" as possible.
I asked these questions to assess their driving personality. After I received all of their response, I called their spouses too, to confirm their answeres. It's amazing, but everyone seemed to be telling the truth about their driving personality.
Session III
After completing my assessment on their driving personality, I met with them for the last time, and I was very amazed to be able to get them all in one room at the same time. I gave each of them a copy of my assesstment. In my assessment report, I identified them my QDC participants as A, B, C, D, and E. Based on the survey they filled out, I found that A had a problem in the following areas. Phase I, traffic safety issue, particularly zones 2 and 3 which is the cognitive and sensorimotor. B had a problem on all phases of driving behavior. His weakness lied on zones 1(affeftive), 2(cognitive), 5(cognitive), 7(affective), and 9(sensoritmotor). C appeard to have the worst case of raod rage. He had problems on all phases of driving behavior. The zones he had problems were zones 1and 4 on the affective domain, zones 2, 5, and 8 on the cognitive domain, and zones 6 and 9 on the sensorimotor domain. D, on the other hand appeared to be the best driver among the all. His only weakness was phase I of zone 3 which is the sensorimotor domain of behavior. E is another driver with road rage. E was weak in all phases especially on zones 1 and 4 (affective), 5 and 8 (cognitive), and 6 (sensorimotor).
I was very amazed on the level of opennes each of my QDC participants exhibited through the survey. It did not appear that any of them were surprized about the results. Perhaps they were just amazed on the extent of their bad driving habbit, particularly road rage. Although I did not have much time to meet with them, I was very glad that they are more aware of their driving habits. Althought I had encourage them to improve on their weeknesses, I wouldn't be able to assess how their driving habits would change in the long run. Perhaps, since I work with them, I could continue working on my QDC.
It's amazing how QDC has been growing. We may not realize how it has been promoted through every traffic psychology student. Each student has the capacity to influence two to three people depending on how big the group they form. I believe that through student's reports semester every semester, QDC will build up and perhaps catch a larger audience in the future.
There is no best way to promote QDC. Just like any other new idea, it cannot be expected to grow rapidly. I think one of the most likely, which is already in effect, is to start from the grassroots, the students. Colleges nationwide should offer the same or similar type of traffic psychology classes like the one we have here at U.H. If every semester, each traffic psychology class will have 15 to 20 students, and every student will have 3 to 5 QDC members, immagine how many people will have awareness of the potentials of this program. Of course, mass media promotion are always effective, but if we could get students to advocate to the promotion of QDC through classes, I think it would be more interesting and enjoyable.
I have mentioned earlier that the students are the grassroots of QDC. It is important that students are made aware of the existence of such class. Campuswide promotion of QDC, I think, is very important.
I would that I am very fortunate to have taken this class. It may not be the most exciting class I've ever had, but I have learned very much. It is a little hard for me since I don't know how to drive, but if I do learn to drive one day, I know, I will be a good driver because of the knowledge that I have now about the dangers and benefits of driving. I think the most challenging part of this report is setting up my own QDC. It was not easy. At times, it could be very intimidating. It is a very good experience, not only for me but also for my QDC members. I know that they have learned another aspect of their driving personality. Whether they do something about it or not, I know that they will always remember the sessions we had and the discussions we had. Most importantly, the idea of QDC.
Anthony Chung
Lisa Among
Raeder Kinney
Dina Takahashi
Agren's QDC: The Very Unlikely Manager
___ Feeling impatient with the pace of traffic, feeling that you're being held back.
___ Being patient or self-controlled while waiting at traffic lights, stop signs, while someone pulls in or out of a parking space, or in traffic flow delays.
___ It's my opinion that it's alright to drive 10 to 15 miles above the speed limit.
___ I think it's wrong for me to drive at the speed limit when everyone else is going faster.
___ Observing or noting mistakes in driving.
___ Realizing how your driving behavior is influenced by mood and environment.
___ Executing an incorrect or illegal act in routine driving situations.
___ Driving with insufficient concentration or with a sense of distraction.
___ Keeping-up with traffic without breaking the speed limit.
___ Feeling intimidated or stigmatized by the actions of other drivers.
___ Wanting to pressure or coerce other drivers.
___ Watching out for the potential errors of other highway users.
___ Misinterpreting the causes of one's own driving actions, rationalizing or justifying one's faulty behavior.
___ Finding a personal justification for doing the wrong thing (e.g., speeding or failing to yield when in a hurry).
___ Thinking that you are isolated in your car and that no one can see you.
___ Making up reasonable explanations for the intentions or behaviors of other highway users.
___ Giving objective reasons for your own driving actions or feelings.
___ Insulting other highway users or passengers with words or gestures.
___ Pressuring or coercing another highway user or passenger.
___ Remaining calm and resisting pressure in the face of provocation.
___ Denying one's guilt or being hostile when told of one's faulty actions.
___ Ignoring the comfort and safety of passengers.
___ Being fearful of causing injury or damage to someone.
___ Caring about others' feelings.
___ Imagining or predicting the consequences of one's driving actions or those of others.
___ Using facts (such as accident rates) to re-assert one's commitment to safe driving.
___ Denigrating the character of drivers by their physical appearance or that of their car.
___ Acting tough and threatening to make sure I'm being respected.
___ Berating myself for driving errors (being over critical or judgmental).
___ Berating others for driving errors (being over critical or judgmental).
___ Tailgating and chasing motorists to teach them a lesson.
___ Being frenzied because the traffic flow is too slow.
___ Yelling and gesturing at passengers, pedestrians, and other drivers.
___ Enjoying the drive, the scenery, the deliberate and controlled movements in driving.
___ Enjoying sentiments of good will towards other road users.
___ Maintaining a good mood while driving.
1. Tell me, as a driver, how do you exhibit courtesy on the road?
2. Tell me how patient are you in traffic and discuss what causes you to loose patience.
3. Tell me what do you think and what has been your experience in regards to the following:
4. Tell me, in general, how do you react to offensive drivers?
5. In general, what do you think about road rage?
21st Century Traffic Psychologists
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