Report 1: Initial Self-assessment as a driver
What is traffic Psychology? before coming to this class I didn't know what traffic psychology really was. Even though I was experiencing it everyday in one form or another, walking, riding a bicycile or a moped, driving a car. In the beginnning I was very hesitant or reculentent to try doing things on the computer. I found it very hard and frustrating to get into the computer labs and having to wait or using my connections to get access to a computer. I then brought my computer from home and the darn thing blew up on me. Though all these things happened I managed to stay with it with a little encouragement and success in lab.
The first thing for the paper was to look up generation one files and read them. I entered Netscape and typed in the box where the location was at Dr. James's home page. I went through most of his links to see if there was anything really cool to look at. I found the links to certain topics in traffic psychology and clicked on the topics I chose to record on: speeding, rushing, tailgating, swearing, and personaloty changing. It gave me some good information on some items but for most I had to look at the whole file to find what I was looking for. It seemed to me that the information was all rammed together in one big bundle. Hopefully I won't do that with my own file. I then went to Generation One Psy 459 students lab reports. It showed me all the links to the students reports. So I read and read and read and read some more. Insted of printing the whole files and wasting paper, down loaded the files onto my disk and took them home to read. It was a chore but I tried to read everything that was there.
I was reading Josephine Allen's report and I could really relate to much to her tailgating opinions. In fact I totally agree to what she is say that tailgating doesn't get anybody any where fast. Frustrating as it may seem people don't realized that it is a problem. A proble nobody realizes until they get into a car accident. Even near accidents don't really phase the Hawaiian traffic driver. They get back out there to tailgate another person. I can agree with her that there should be a law against tailgating. The problem with that is the enforcement by the police. I have driven in many place all over the country and Hawaii's Police officers must be the most leaniant force in the nation when it comes to traffic violations. How do I know? Well passing H.P.D. at about 65 m.p.h and not doing anything about it to me seems very relaxed. Especially here, where we are in a confined area and it takes only about 45 minutes to get anywhere around the island. Which leads me to the next topic about making a law about tailgating, everybody does it. What are we going to do? Fine everybody. It would be a good law to pass but I think that it would be hard to iniciate to the public. Did you ever wonder about the days where you would let some one in front of you and they would wave or shakka you. What happened? I found another source of tailgating by Caroline Balatoco. To me it covered the spiritual side of the matter. Heaven and hell. Who's going where? it seems that those who are infinging on others driving space are getting what they deserve. Being raised catholic myself makes me wonder if in fact when we go to the pearly gates in the sky, does it really matter the way we drive. If it does, "oh boy, I'm going straight to hell for that one!!!" I reall never thought that there could be a spiritual sense about driving. Now thinking about it that isn't necessarly the truth. I had my car blessed and I have a gold cross on the gear shift and a rosary on the rear view window. These two points of view are at oppisite ends of each other. It is good to see across the spectrum of views. one had and individuals point of view where the other has a spiritual attachment to it. The signifiance to traffic psy is that you can incoperate culture values to individual values.
I then went to Shane Akagi's home page and found his listings for various topics. Ther I found a paragraph about rushing. The would is a crazy place and it seems that those who get information quicker and faster usually are the one who are on top of everything or are in control of things. That is my explanation to why things are always rushed. I also think that the persons irration beliefs in that you have to get things done as quickly as possible is totally false. He's right,nobody lives in the now but in the future. Looking under speeding I found an intersting artice by Joleen Lai. She states that she hates speeders and that they are the reasons for most car accidents. There is no purpose to speeding because everybody gets there the same time anyways. It also isn't good to speed on the island since it's too small. One reaction to her paper whichI think is incorrect is the fact if you speed you'll get caught. NOT! I've been speeeding of the past 6 years and have never got a ticket for speeding. (knock on wood!) Reading her artice I found a link to Caroline Balatico speeding article. She also hates speeders and feels that people should learn to have patience to wait till it's your turn to go. It also states that they waouldn't get any more frustrated than they would be if they were speeding. Her idea seems to be good in one sense but you have to remember it is a dog-eat-dog world where one must compet to get anywhere. The two articles are very similar to each other and I wish I could have searched longer to get a different point of view. The signifiance is that they point out things that I don't really pay attention to. If somebody reads their article and thinks about their own situation benefits from it, I have.
Looking for articles under mood swings was scarce for me. Claudia Kaneshiro talks about the previous generation students where they seem to be the nicest people and put them in traffic they turn into something from the deepest and darkests pits of hell. It also states that they talk about two wrongs not equaling a right but in a situation that rationalization goes out the door. Laura Izutsu states that her mood at the time of an incident instigated a resonse, bad or good. If she is in a good mood she usually just lets things slid but when you catch her in a bad mood you'd better run for cover. Reading these two articles mad me think that there are two different prespectives looking at two different things. The first one stated that the person can change without warning and the second artice states that depending on the time and the situation determines the behavior.
Self observation
"Andrew Dice Clay," he doesn't have anything on me when I'm driving on the road. Befor doing my self observation I didn't realize how much I actually swear. On the average I would say for every ten minutes there would have to be at least two bad word coming out of my mouth. My girlfriend first pointed it out to me when I was thinking about topics to writing this paper. "F*&K" seems to be the word mostly used by my foul mouth. This is definately some thing that I have to change. For the most part it happens when my car's personal space is being violated. On observation I generally swear more when I am alone. It tends to cut down when there are passangers, especially those who are older than me.
"Lead foot," that's what happens as soon as there is an opening in traffic or a clear road ahead of me. The foot has to go down! The rush of swatting past other cars, griping the turns, having the loose items in the car fly and hit the other side. It doesn't help that I have a laser detector in my car. It is like a passport to speed. It doesn't help that I also drive a sports car. The car that I have was meant to be driven fast, it says so in my car magazines, " corvettes are meant to be driven at 70+ m.p.h." It is funny that I actually feel that it is my purpose, my destiny to drive very quickly. The places where I do drive kinda crazy would be on H-1,H-2, Nimitz highway, and Kunia road. Observing my driving, I have noticed that I have averaged about 70-75 m.p.h. on the freeways and about 15 m.p.h. over the posted speed limit in most areas. The fastest I ever went was about 121 m.p.h. in my mother's Honda Accord(go figure). I speed more in during the night, but I drive mostly at night. I feel that it would be harder for a cop to catch me in an event that I get caught. But that idea goes out the door because my car's color is white. I once ditched a cop that was at least a mile behind me, or so I thought it was a cop. I couldn't really tell but it looked like the was a blue light flashing on top of the vechicle. I haven't and will not ever do that again.
Sometimes when I drive it always seems that I am trying to beat time. I feel the need to get some where as soon as I can for no particular reason. I just have to get somewhere in the least amount of time. I guess it could be called bragging rights to see who can get somewhere the quickest. It could also be that constant presure to preform at your highest potential you can. I have always been pushed by those around me to try to be good at what ever I do. I have always been prasied by my parents on how to drive, the way I can reverse park within the lines perfectly with one try. When I was young I loved cars, (fast cars) and driving them. All I wanted to do was to be a race car driver . I figure that I speed because I have to furfil the need of what I wanted and what I should have been when I grew up.
Like a "Road Warrior" finding every crevis to get through traffic quicker by any means possible. It seems that everytime I get behind the wheel that I am late to be somewhere. That is why all the clocks I own are about ten to fifteen minutes earlier. If I am late, which is most of the time, I take many unneccessary risks in order to get somewhere quicker. Though most of the time I only get there 1 or 2 minutes quicker, which doesn't mean anything if I'm already late. I know that 1 or 2 minutes isn't much of a difference but it feels like an eternity when you're stuck in traffic. This topic is directly related to one of my other problems that I have to deal with, not budgeting my time very well. I don't give enough time to do the things that I need to do in order to get some where on time. I frequently rush to get home to go to church. I speed on the freeway cutting whoever off in order to get to church on time. One funny think that popes into my mind thinking about this situation is that A priest told when he blessed my car that the angels would always follow me but that they couldn't go over 70.
Rushing though has made my traveling a differantiated one. The way I rush is differianted by the time of day. During certain times of the day there is a "pattern" to getting some where fast. I have learned this from observation and from my girlfriend. If one was coming to town from the leeward side you could possibley get to town faster by going through the airport side. Why? Because a lot of traffic occurs at the King sreet exit by Tripler. Usually if I am coming from town to go to the Leeward side at about three o'clock I usually wouldn't even touch the freeways. I would take King street, off at Dillingham Blvd. on go onto Nimtz freeway or go through the back roads in Makiki and get onto Vineyard and get onto Moanalua freeway from there. I also find that I have a pattern to which lane I drive in, for instance after the Tripler off ramp I cut all the way to the right. After the Red Hill exit there is little if any traffic in that lane and I speed up and pass everybody. In traffic coming toward town I usually stay in the left lane till I get to the King street exit on Moanalua freeway and cut all the way to the right. As soon as I reach the Middle street over pass I try to get to the middle lane and after the Vineyard exit I get into the left lane and either switch between the left lane or the middle lane until I reach UH. Though rushing has its bad points, I fell that it has helped me a little to plan strageties to get where I need to be in a certain time allowed. The bad thing is that I have been accustomed to it that it would be very hard for me to change the way I drive.
"Kissing Ass," not the brown nosing type but riding on the bumper of the car in front of you. This usually occurs when one of these things happen: 1. a car is going too slow, 2. someone cuts me off, 3. or I see someone tailgating and I feel that I should show them how it feels, 4. somebody is tailgating me and "I do onto others as they do to me." One thing that really irratates me is when some one cuts me off, and you can tell that they are going to cut you off, and they do not use their turn signals. I find though I do tail gate it is done very infrequently. Most of the time it depends on my mood. The only time that I frequently tailgate is during traffic. I think that it bring the devil out in everybody. You have to tailgate to some extent or some one is going to "snake" you and cut you off. From then on out one must try to conform to the driver ahead of them and try to play psychic friend and try to read their intentions.
It is sad to think that I could behave like some that I am not. I am a tyrant out on the highway. I don't care who it is that I'm tailgating and I don't realize that they are other people just like me. I also sterotype quite a bit while tailgating. Like "damn lady drivers, where did you get your lisence, Liberty House." It sounds reall bad but it is the truth. My deepest darkest feelings explode behind the wheel. If some one cuts be off and comes really close and doesn't signal I turn into a mad man. I turn on my light and highbeam the person while literally riding on the persons bumper. I have freaked out my passangers doing this. Luckly I think that I have only done this 3 or 4 time. The stupid thing about it is that it isn't going to do anything about the problem. I feel that these feelings would not come out if I wasn't prevoked in the first place. Just thinking about the previous tail gating incident, it seem like I am physiclly harassing someone. I have been harassed by someone and I didn't like it at all. I didn't realize till right now that is what I have been doing. I have reached the second stage in behavior modification, knowing that I have a problem.
"Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde" One thing that I notice is that I change moods when I am in the car. Usually I am not a very moody person but for some reason or another my moods go right off the scale. Mood depends on many things. I find that the music that I am listening to has a great effect on my mood. If the music is uplifting, no matter what worries I have or how many things that I need to get done, it doesn't phase me at all.
I feel that the car has a certain reaction to my body. If for I listen to something fast like Metalica I just turn to a speed demon. The music I listen to determines my driving style. If I listen to a fast classical song like "Ride of the Valkaries" I seem to drive like I'm on a back road with no one on the road taking turns with confidence with a lot of speed and power. On intersting note, when I take the top off my car and drive, even in traffic there really isn't anything that could ruin my calm and peaceful mood. Like the Janet Jackson's song says, "Leave your worries behind." I think that it is my own personal utopia.
Though I am one to think that we have a soul and our mind controls what we do I have to take the other point of veiw, namly nature. I think there is some thing physiology based that I learned in Biopsychology which could explain what happens when I drive. When a drug user does drugs in a familiar environment, the person takes higer doseages of the drug to get a high. This is due to the body being stimualated to the environment. If the same person takes drugs in a different environment at the same level as he/she would at home the body would not be stimulated to create the hormones to digest the drug and thus the person would over dose. Every time I get into my car I get a rush. This doesn't really nessitate that I am driving but that physically being in my car or being next to my car has an effect to where I am accustomed to certain stimuli already. That stimuli is the reckless driving that I do. That Is why I don't get a rush from the way I drive, even though it is extreme. If this is the case I am always in a hightend state when I am in my car. I think this is truue because when I drive other people's cars I don't usually drive the way I do in my car. You might think I might be more catious but that isn't the case all the time. I find that even driving my mother's car, even though I have been driving it since it was bought, I don't drive the way I do as in my car.
Conclusion
I feel that I have a ton of changing to do. My driving personality doesn't really reflect my true personality. I am somewhat astonished about the results of my observation but not too superised about it. I have always been concerned about my driving but now I am more concerned. As for traffic Psychology, I feel that I have only began to scratch the surface of what traffic psychology is. Before class I thougth that all it was about driving not what it really is. Hopefully I can better access to a computer to read more about it.