The guilty, the unlucky, or the unaware? Assessing self-reported behavioral contributors and attributions on pedestrian crashes through structural equation modeling and mixed methods. (September 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Useche, Sergio A.; Llamazares, Francisco J.
• Is Part Of: Journal of safety research. Volume 82(2022)
• Page Start: 329
• Page End: 341
• Publication Date: 2022-09
• Subjects: Pedestrians -- Risky behaviors -- Errors -- Traffic violations -- Positive behaviors -- Self-reported walking crashes; Industrial safety -- Periodicals; Accidents -- Prevention -- Periodicals; Safety -- Periodicals; Accidents, Occupational -- Periodicals; Sécurité du travail -- Périodiques; Accidents -- Prévention -- Périodiques; Accidents -- Prevention; Industrial safety; Periodicals; 363.1
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jsr.2022.06.009
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0022-4375

Abstract

Highlights: Behavioral contributors of traffic crashes seem to differ among types of road users. Literature remains limited to explain behavioral-based traffic crashes of pedestrians. This study aimed to assess the effect of behavioral contributors on walking crashes. SEM suggests that violations and errors might differently influence walking crashes. Categorical analyses show that causal attributions for crashes depend on the beholder. Abstract: Introduction: Recent literature suggests that the causation of pedestrians' crashes and the contribution of safety-related behaviors within them may substantially differ compared to other road users. This study aimed to test the effect of individual factors and safety-related road behaviors on the self-reported walking crashes suffered by pedestrians and, complementarily, to analyze the causes that pedestrians attributed to the crashes they suffered as pedestrians during the previous five years. Method: For this cross-sectional research performed in Spain, data from a nationwide sample of 2, 499 pedestrians from the 17 regions of the country were collected. Participants had a mean age of 31 years. They responded to a questionnaire on demographics, safety-related walking behaviors, and self-reported pedestrian crashes and the causes attributed to them. Results: Utilizing Structural Equation Models (SEM), it was found that self-reported walking crashes can be predicted through unintentional risky behaviors (errors). However, violations and positive behaviors remain non-significant predictors, allowing to hypothesize that they might, rather, play a key role in the pedestrian's involvement in pre-crash scenarios (critical situations preceding crashes). Also, categorical analyses allowed to determine that the causes that pedestrians attributed to the walking crashes they had suffered were principally their own errors (44.6%), rather than their own traffic violations (8.5%). Nevertheless, this trend is inverse when they believe the responsibility of the crash weighs on the driver. That is to say, they usually attribute the crash to their traffic violations rather than errors. However, many biases could help explain these attributional findings. Practical Applications: The results of this study highlight key differences in behavioral features and crash predictors among pedestrians, with potentially relevant applications in the study and improvement of walking safety from behavioral-based approaches.