Driving Safety

To ensure that future drivers are adequately trained, courses and certifications such as Driver’s Ed schools, multiple tests and supervised training under permits. So why do car accidents continue to increase and cause close to 50,000 deaths yearly in the United States despite all the legal precautions? It comes down to basic common sense: before controlling something as dangerously large and fast as a car, future drivers must be properly taught its implications alongside its handlement. Teaching anything and everything related to driving, from which pedal is the gas to being aware that you should not drive tired or under the influence, will ensure we raise a generation of attentive and safe drivers. Keeler’s paper on Highway Safety, Economic Behavior and Driving Environment from the American Economic Review provided “evidence that, at least for auto safety, the relationship between education and health is not a spurious one caused by omitted variables.” The paper proves that education on driving safety undoubtedly promotes health.

The problem begins to stem from teenagers’ underestimation of how serious it is to drive a car. Beck, Hartos and Simons-Morton state that adolescents attach central importance to the privilege of operating a motor vehicle. And this isn’t only mentioned in fancy journals: the closest friend I grew up with would not stop raving about owning a white Rolls Royce and how “cool” it would be to drive one. Such a reaction is understandable since automobiles are one of the first properties teenagers can own. Yet this ownership comes with a great responsibility that most future drivers fail to acknowledge. Cars are still used to drive to and from parties, sometimes with dangerously impaired inattentiveness.

Even though proper education already exists and is mandatory for license owners, other forms of influence toward safe driving must be implemented. The abstract “Teen Driving Risk: The Promise of Parental Influence and Public Policy” raises the idea of parents being more strict with their kids. Beck, Hartos and Simons-Morton refer to parents as the “principal gatekeepers for driving privileges. They can control when teens get their license, which vehicles they are allowed to drive, and when and where they are allowed to drive.” The researchers believe parents exert “less control over teen driving than might be expected and that is consistent with safety.” New drivers tend to be under or around 18 and still need parental influence in their life, so intervention from their parents could be an essential way to promote automotive safety. Another source highlights graduated driver licensing programs restricting when and where teens can drive. This source, a research literature titled “Night Driving Restrictions for Youthful Drivers: A Literature Review and Commentary” was written by Williams and Preusser. They believe that “young drivers have a disproportionate number of crashes… because they lack the full development of judgmental and decision-making skills of older people.” To combat this problem, they propose implementing graduated driver licensing programs. The programs allow for teens to have the satisfaction of driving but also be restricted to prevent crashes. These programs seem to be much more effective than school-based education programs in reducing adolescent MVCS.

Such education is especially important in a modern urban setting. Bustling cities are the epitome of economic, trading, political and job center. A lot of action is required to keep such an effective society functioning. Without instilling driver safety into maturing individuals who will soon be contributing to and navigating these centers, they will put themselves and innocent lives in unnecessary danger. Too often have my friends or I been almost hit through the streets of Manhattan and Brooklyn. This kind of fear is more than unwarranted. Even more unnecessary was that my mother, who abided by road laws by checking the direction of oncoming traffic, was still rear-ended by a careless driver backing up over the speed limit. The experience scared me to the point where I have become afraid of reverse-driving cars. My mother and her family, including me, could’ve avoided a lot of emotional stress if that driver had been aware of the dangers his reckless driving posed.

I am taking my experiences and knowledge of road safety when I will begin driving under a permit. The last thing I want to cause is an inconvenience to a person’s day. But more importantly, I want to make sure I am keeping myself and others safe when I drive. Some examples of doing so would be to never drive when I don’t feel confident that I can transport anyone safely, including feeling tired or dizzy. I would not drive without my glasses on, and I would not drive without paying full attention to the road.