How We Pay Attention: Questions, Comments, and Solutions on Driver’s Safety and Education

11 years ago this year, on a mild summer afternoon of an inconspicuous Friday 13th (if there is such a thing), a small brown Subaru drove straight through a stop sign. I have heard experts say memory is a fickle thing – that what we do remember is often shaped by what people have told us, what we have said, and a million other things like completely different memories and outside stimuli. I could swear though, if you asked me, that I remember how the window shards were shaped like tiny squares when they scattered across my lap. I remember the feeling of numbness and confusion and the sound of muffled talking. I remember the screech of car tires, slamming doors, and my mother running to the ambulance. At some point, they told me that the only injury was a bitten tongue. They didn’t know that it would also be 11 years of back pain, a musician’s continued annoyance, and months of visiting physical therapists. I have the privilege, today, of being able to think back to that time and wondering what might have happened. I have the privilege of not knowing.

The Journal of Safety Research, in 2003, stated that, annually, almost 700,000 accidents occurred at stop signs, ⅓ of which caused injury, and around 3,000 of which were fatal. Looking at statistics of driving incidents, one will find that, as of recently, the US Department of Transportation has combined its annual performance report with its upcoming plans to promote safety and public consideration. In their 2023 report, they state that just under 95% of America’s transportation fatalities occur on roadways, and that, recently, these numbers have only been rising (2023).

Most people in America receive their driver’s permit at around 15 years old. By 16, many pass a driving exam and get their license. As a 19-year-old who only recently earned my driver’s license, much time in high school was spent catching rides with friends. Reflecting back upon this time, many of my friends were rather careless in their driving, taking quick turns and being indecisive. As a passenger, I felt uncomfortable, but also as though I didn’t have the right to call them out on their mistakes. I’m sure many of my friends felt the same way. Most of us learned to drive not from a professional or educational system, but from our parents, who were taught by their parents, and their parents before them. This form of education for something that essentially puts the lives of other people in our hands cannot be sustainable. Certainly, it was not mine nor my friends’ responsibility to hold each other accountable for our driving, although we certainly should have been doing so. It is no surprise, then, that many teenagers are involved in car accidents. However, there are more realistic forms of safety and education than simply being accountable.

Many people claim that driver’s education is important to a person’s ability to drive, and is an effective and popular way to improve vehicle safety. However, a 2021 review of studies on this topic found that, while driver’s education improves confidence in driving, performance, and minor traffic violations, it is not effective in achieving the desired outcome – reducing crashes, vehicle-related injuries, and fatalities. They claim that this education focuses too heavily on “driving behaviors” and only general information about safety. This improves a person’s knowledge and attitude, but not necessarily behavior. Despite highlighting the ineffectiveness of this approach, an immediate solution is not given. It may be possible, however, to update the methods and curriculum of such a program to better suit the real issues in vehicle safety. In my own accident 11 years ago, for example, the issue was certainly not that the driver was unaware that one was supposed to stop at a stop sign. How do we better educate our new drivers?

Another approach to traffic safety that may be reliable, in this case, would be forms of transportation and the civil engineering of roads and pedestrian areas. In Japan, for example, statistics place the number of car accidents at roughly 0.4 road deaths per 10,000 registered vehicles. National Safety Council places America at 1.5 deaths per 10,000 vehicles (“Historical car crash deaths and rates”). One of the reasons for Japan’s low vehicle fatalities is perhaps the roughly 25 billion people annually carried via public transportation, which America is sorely lacking. Of course, this is only a hypothesis. The second approach is civil engineering and how the driver perceives the road and conditions. A long, wide, flat road, for example, has “low information density,” meaning that the driver has no reason to perceive new information, risk, or uncertainty. However, a small road with many curves has a much higher information density, and the driver is placed in a position of uncertainty, which will cause them to pay more attention to their surroundings and drive at lower speeds. There are many more things, as well, that will cause a driver to naturally drive slower. However, many come with risks, and should not always be recommended as an immediate solution. Some examples of this are bumpier roads, narrower lanes, clear markings, objects next to the road such as houses and trees, lack of visual clutter, and legible signs.

In the case of the accident 11 years ago, it is difficult to say why the driver made the decision they did. Many accidents are the same. In the end, driving performance is dependent on the driver’s state of mind, knowledge, and perception of the environment. This can be shaped by many factors, including previous knowledge that they learn through such things as formal education, possible distractions, and the environment itself. I propose that all three of these aspects must be addressed to lessen the drastic number of accidents occurring in America today. If we aim to focus our driver’s education on the perception of the environment, focus, and critical analysis, as well as changing the environment and possible distractions to promote these behaviors, drivers, passengers, and pedestrians will all be safer.