Mad as hell behind the wheel

You drive just the way you live, says a traffic psychologist

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By Marko Jokela
     
      OK. Hands up anyone of you who can say they have never lost it when behind the wheel of a car?
      On a daily basis, people's tempers are torn and frayed by drivers who barefacedly cut them up, dodge around on the inside, change lanes without resorting to even the most primitive or abrupt use of an indicator, or who cross junctions as though they were walking on eggs.
     
"The person who overtakes by nipping in and out of the dedicated bus lane steals space and time from others. This gets right up the nose of normal decent road-users", observes Prof. Heikki Summala from the University of Helsinki.
      Summala should know what he is on about, as he holds the chair in traffic psychology at the Department of Psychology in Helsinki.
      "Yes, of course it ticks people off when someone acts completely contrary to expectations and comes charging into their space."
     
Summala has no problems with drivers muttering expletives to themselves about the behaviour of others around them, but when the loss of cool gets to flashing headlights and giving the finger, we have crossed a threshold that can lead to a nasty spiral of provocation and response.
      For example, when an iffy overtaking manoeuvre slides out of control into two cars chasing each other until one of them runs out of road and winds up wrapped around a pine tree.
      The consequences of this sort of machoism can be serious in the extreme.
     
People interpret their own driving behaviour as a course of action that is dictated by the surrounding circumstances.
      They do not tend to be as understanding towards the behaviour of others, often reading it as wilful bloody-mindedness.
      According to Summala, some drivers really do feel superior when they get behind the wheel, even though everybody makes mistakes and there is no room for hubris.
      Serious disregard for one's own safety and the safety of others is nevertheless relatively uncommon in Finland, he charges.
      "The great majority of mistakes in traffic derive from not paying enough attention or from carelessness, and not out of deliberate risk-taking", says Summala.
     
The consequences of road rage find their way into the headlines.
      As we noted in a column last week, a car and a truck carrying snow met on a narrow street in downtown Helsinki, and neither party showed any willingness to reverse in order that the two vehicles could safely pass each other.
      In the end the irate truck-driver lost it, revved up, and started to push the car bodily out of the way.
      Last May, a man in Ostrobothnia took offence at an oncoming car that was using its fog-lights, presumably when the visibility would not have warranted this.
      The enraged man made a sharp U-turn and caught up with the other car.
      After an angry exchange, the man battered the female driver of the other car, who was carrying three children in the back seat.
      The man was fined and order to pay EUR 1,000 in costs to the woman for the pain and temporary discomfort she had suffered.
     
In March 2006, the late-edition tabloid Ilta-Sanomat reported on a particularly grievous case of road rage.
      A 46-year-old man had become more than irritated by the driving style of the owner of a Mercedes station wagon on Highway 1 between Helsinki and Turku, and he forced the Mercedes off the motorway and onto the hard shoulder.
      The man then took out a hefty spanner and with some powerful blows he redesigned the bonnet, roof, and side-panels of the offending car.
     
According to Heikki Summala, we are normally quite a law-abiding bunch in traffic: for all that there are exceptions, Finland has a decent traffic environment and a developed driving culture.
      For instance in Turkey, Britain, and The Netherlands, cases of road rage are more common than here in Finland, if questionnaire studies are to be believed.
      In particular it is the Finnish women who show up well in the surveys.
      Many studies have indicated that the worst behaviour found on the roads hereabouts comes from men between the ages of 20 and 40.
      The ability to handle the controls of a car and to predict what might happen next so as to reduce risk - "defensive driving" - are only two elements of good driving habits. "The most important skill lies between the ears: the ability to provide space to others."
     
People who seek experiences in life are prone to use driving a car as a means of getting kicks. This can lead to conflict situations.
      Once in a while, everybody should ask themselves Why is it that I am driving?.
      When someone gets behind the wheel, it is not just their arms and legs that are present, but the driver's entire persona and character, warts and all.
      If we know the motives, feelings, habits and skills of a person who drives, then we can make a pretty good stab at predicting how he or she will behave at the wheel.
      In the investigation of serious road accidents, it has been noted that a driver's self-awareness and self-control are significant factors.
      A low tolerance threshold for getting tense and nervous adds to the accident risk.
     
People tend to behave at the supermarket checkout in a pretty similar fashion to the way they are in traffic, Summala argues.
      If you are the type to get bent out of shape with the person in front of you who has absent-mindedly forgotten to weigh her tomatoes, then you are likely to be equally tetchy at traffic lights.
      "You drive just the way you live."
     
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 29.1.2011

More on this subject:
 Ways to keep cool in the car

See also:
  Refusing to yield – to snow or economic reality (25.1.2011)

Links:
  Road Rage (Wikipedia)
  University of Helsinki Traffic Research Unit

MARKO JOKELA / Helsingin Sanomat
marko.jokela@hs.fi