Traffic injury prevention
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Traffic injury prevention · Jan 2014
Alcohol involvement and other risky driver behaviors: effects on crash initiation and crash severity.
Alcohol-involved drivers or those with blood alcohol concentrations greater than 0.00 percent have more frequent and more severe crashes than other drivers. Alcohol use, because it delays perception and response and impairs coordination, increases the risk of a crash. However, those using alcohol may take additional driving risks, which may also lead to crashes. This study was done to learn whether risks besides alcohol involvement contributed to crash initiation and whether crash severity increased with alcohol involvement or with those other risky behaviors. ⋯ Risky driving behaviors, including alcohol involvement, increased the risk of a crash. Crash severity tended to increase with any risky behavior and to increase further with multiple risky behaviors. Other risky behaviors were associated with both alcohol involvement and crashes. Therefore, if effects from those other risky behaviors were not accommodated for, those effects would confound apparent associations between alcohol involvement and crashes. Therefore, this study's use of multivariate models that accommodated for effects from those other behaviors provided a truer picture of alcohol's association with crashes than simpler models would have. Supplemental materials are available for this article. Go to the publisher's online edition of Traffic Injury Prevention to view the supplemental file.
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Traffic injury prevention · Jan 2014
Drivers' attitudes toward front or rear child passenger belt use and seat belt reminders at these seating positions.
Passengers, especially those in rear seating positions, use seat belts less frequently than drivers. In-vehicle technology can inform drivers when their passengers are unbuckled and encourage passengers to use belts. The current study collected information about drivers' attitudes toward passenger belt use and belt reminders for front passengers and children in back seats. ⋯ Many drivers, especially those who always use seat belts, said they would encourage unbuckled passengers to buckle up and supported auditory and visual belt reminders for passengers, particularly for children sitting in the back seat. Front and rear passenger reminders that last indefinitely would be acceptable to most drivers who transport these passengers. An auditory alert may be especially useful to alert drivers to children unbuckling in the back seat during a trip.
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Traffic injury prevention · Jan 2014
Age and gender differences in time to collision at braking from the 100-Car Naturalistic Driving Study.
Forward collision warning (FCW) is an active safety system that aims to mitigate the effect of forward collisions by warning the driver of objects in front of the vehicle. Success of FCW relies on how drivers react to the alerts. Drivers who receive too many warnings that they deem as unnecessary-that is, nuisance alarms-may grow to distrust and turn the system off. To reduce the perception of nuisance alarms, FCW systems can be tailored to individual driving styles, but these driving styles must first be characterized. The objective of this study was to characterize differences in braking behavior between age and gender groups in car-following scenarios using data from the 100-Car Naturalistic Driving Study. ⋯ There are clear statistical differences in TTC at braking for both gender and those over 30 vs. those under 30. Designers of FCW systems can use the data found in this study to tailor alert timings to the target demographic of a vehicle when designing forward collision warning systems. Appropriate alert timings for FCW systems will maximize effectiveness in collision reduction and mitigation.
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Traffic injury prevention · Jan 2014
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, other mental health problems, substance use, and driving: examination of a population-based, representative canadian sample.
The purpose of this study is to examine the relationships among self-reported screening measures of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), other psychiatric problems, and driving-related outcomes in a provincially representative sample of adults 18 years and older living in the province of Ontario, Canada. ⋯ This study is the first population-based study of a representative sample of adults 18 years and older living in Ontario, Canada. These results showed no relationship between the ADHD screen and collision when age, sex, and kilometers driven are controlled for. However, these analyses are based on self-report screeners and not psychiatric diagnoses and a limited sample of ADHD respondents. Thus, these results should be interpreted with caution.
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Traffic injury prevention · Jan 2014
Survey about pedestrian safety and attitudes toward automated traffic enforcement in Washington, D.C.
Pedestrians represent more than one third of all traffic deaths in Washington, D.C. The District plans to expand its long-standing automated traffic enforcement program in 2013 from speed and red light cameras to cameras to enforce pedestrian right-of-way laws at crosswalks and stop sign laws. This study collected information on the opinions, behaviors, and knowledge of D.C. residents related to camera enforcement and pedestrian safety issues. ⋯ Most residents supported speed cameras and red light cameras, but support was lower for stop sign and crosswalk cameras. Emphasizing the safety benefits of stop sign and crosswalk cameras and documenting the extent of safety problems at stop signs and crosswalks may increase support for these new forms of camera enforcement. Communities considering automated enforcement should take into account the opinions of pedestrians, even though they are not subject to camera citations.