TSC Newsletter:Traffic Safety and Teens

The UC Berkeley Traffic Safety Center (TSC) is developing a teen traffic safety best practices guide for local and state agencies. As part of that effort, TSC researchers are networking with peers in the public health field and sharing state-of-the-art research, including human development theory, and practices on teen safety.

That was the focus of a fall 2005 workshop at UC Irvine, where TSC Assistant Director Jill Cooper opened the proceedings. It drew community members and public health, education, traffic safety, and law enforcement professionals, including several researchers from TSC and UCI. The goal was to promote the health and safety of young people by providing a forum for discussing current and state-of-the-art work regarding teens.

Federico E. Vaca of the UC Irvine Center for Trauma & Injury Prevention Research provided an overview and facilitated the day, in addition to moderating the panel of presenters. In his overview, Vaca presented some statistics to characterize the risk teens face on the road and listed some of the issues involved like impaired driving, distraction, speeding, safety belt non-use, and developmental factors.

Teens Have Their Own Unique Risks

Nationally, 16-year-old drivers had the highest rate of involvement in fatal crashes; more than 21 times the average. The risk for drowsy driving crashes is highest for 16-to-25-year-old males, Vaca said, and 19 percent of 16-to-20-year-old drivers involved in fatal crashes had blood alcohol concentration levels of .08 (the level at which a driver is in violation of DUI laws).

More than 60 percent of teen passenger deaths occurred when another teen was driving. Moreover, teens comprise 6.3 percent of the state’s population, but 12.5 percent of all fatal and injury collisions. And when they do experience a crash, it is much more likely to be serious, resulting in deaths or injuries. Teens are usually at fault in crashes, usually due to a lack of experience and a tendency to speed, swerve, and engage in other risky behaviors.

These levels of risk occur within the statewide and countrywide context of an exploding population of teenagers. The number of teen drivers, people aged 15 to 19, will increase nearly 25 percent (from 499,000 to 618,000) between 1997 and 2007. The reasons for the increase include the Baby Boom "echo" (as the children of that dominant demographic group enter their teens) and the relatively young ages of recent immigrants and their families.

Elements of Teen Driving Behavior

Keynote speaker Jean Shope, senior research scientist for the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute, elaborated on the issues affecting teen driving behaviors with a behavior-based model for understanding the role that certain factors play in contributing to their higher accident rates.

Her roadmap to a comprehensive understanding of risky driving behavior touched on teen-related personality traits, environments, and familial factors. Teen driving poses a serious and complex public health problem because of gaps in understanding of the big picture and the need to ground interventions in behavioral science theory, which involves social learning theory and problem behavior theory, Shope said.

Influences on teen driver behavior include personality and demographic factors, as well as developmental status, driving ability, the perceived environment, and the actual physical and social driving environment. Shope investigated each influence specifically and detailed how policy can be set and legislation passed to counter negative aspects of such factors. But enforcement of such laws is also necessary, she said. Graduated licensing restrictions on teens—like restrictions on night driving and carrying passengers, as well as anti-drinking measures—could benefit from increased, more consistent enforcement.

Noted TSC's Jill Cooper: “There’s lots of things that have an impact on how teens drive and the environment in which they drive, and too often we’re too simplistic about who’s to blame. Shope has provided a roadmap to further inquiry."

Shope’s lecture preceded panelist presentations from Robert Lee of the California Department of Education, Robert Hagge of the California Department of Motor Vehicles, Nancy Baer of the Contra Costa County Department of Public Health, and Cristy Chen of the anti-DUI group Friday Night Partners.

What Happened to Driver's Ed?

Lee described the effect of cuts in state education funding resulting in fewer public schools offering driver's education courses, and more private companies operating with little regulation. He referred to a story in a major California newspaper describing how teens could purchase certificates of graduation from driver’s education courses online for as little as five dollars. Moreover, fewer and fewer colleges credential driver’s ed teachers, he said.

Next, Hagge presented an assessment of California’s graduated licensing program, which began with provisional licensing in 1983 and progressed to graduated licensing in 1998. Provisional licensing includes a one-month instruction permit and waiting periods before new drivers can enjoy wider privileges. Graduated licensing entails a six-month instruction permit with 50 hours of practice, a 12-month night restriction, and six months of passenger restrictions for drivers under 18.

Graduated Licensing Not an Answer by Itself

In order to gauge the impact of graduated licensing, Hagge did a time series analysis of per capita crash rates between 1994 and 2001 for 15-to-17-year-olds. A control group focused on 24-to-55-year-olds. Hagge found that provisional licensing resulted in less than a five percent reduction in crashes in the target demographic; furthermore, overall crash decreases from graduated licensing laws could not be considered significant.

However, he found that nighttime restrictions did reduce nighttime crashes, and passenger restrictions reduced passenger injury crashes—two of the biggest contributors to teen death and injury. But overall crash rates did not decline, possibly due to difficulties in enforcing graduated licensing laws, granting of numerous exemptions, and lack of penalties if a violation occurs. He followed up this finding by reporting an Insurance Institute for Highway Safety study from 2002 that showed that graduated licensing laws generated no delay in licensure, that parents were already imposing requirements on teen drivers without the law, and that compliance was low.

Hagge suggested alterations to current law, including earlier curfews, requiring drivers to have a clean record to advance, imposition of penalties by the DMV, and accelerating the seriousness of sanctions when violations are discovered.

Advice from At-Risk Youth

Nancy Baer of the Contra Costa County Department of Public Health detailed lessons learned from a government partnership with at-risk youth from Richmond, a city plagued by high arrest, murder, and DUI rates among its youth. Through a California Office of Traffic Safety grant, the department worked with teens who were already enrolled in an anti-tobacco youth group and steered their efforts toward class activities on public safety. The students held classroom presentations on traffic safety.

Cristy Chen, formerly of the youth group California Friday Night Partnership—which targets youth drinking and driving—briefly described her experiences with peer pressure and effective strategies to deter peers from drinking. Chen often acts as a designated driver, a decision she said was reinforced by observing the behavior of her intoxicated peers.

Breakout sessions then occurred where four groups of roughly 15 people each discussed what further could be done to increase teen safety. Topics included research, policy and practice directives for teen driving in general, driver’s education, graduated licensing, and crash prevention.

Next Steps

Notably, the breakout sessions concluded that future research should include comprehensive analyses of teen driving issues in California as well as a social norms study and an asset study of what makes good teen drivers. Correspondingly, additional research on improving driver's education would require means to determine the academic measure of what makes effective driver’s education and who is providing it. Policy steps along this line might include regulating driver's education, involving the State Board of Education, and returning funding to public school training with a standardized curriculum. Further policy suggestions on the topic of graduated licensing included enhancing the program and adding primary enforcement to new zero-tolerance penalties with regulated parental involvement.

TSC Director David Ragland closed the conference with a presentation on the universality of the correlation between risk-taking behavior and stages of human development, especially among males during their late teens and early 20s.

“We see this shape of graph across all cultures and likely all times. Back in dinosaur days I’m sure if you graphed the number of men injured in fights with dinosaurs, the peak would be in the same place. So it’s important that we move forward in our research with this in mind, the fundamental developmental underpinnings of some of these behaviors."

Related Links

Youthquake Ahead, a California Office of Traffic Safety Web site on the traffic safety implications of the state’s growing youth population.

"Teenage drinking to get new focus," a local Mendocino County newspaper story on new teen traffic safety grants in the region.

Teen Drivers' Safety, a page about TSC research and the project to develop a teen driving best practices guide.

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