Do low levels of confidence suppress the tendency to violate?. (May 2018) - McKenna, Frank P.
Highlights: Across the early period of driving, driver confidence increases. Across the early period of driving, the tendency to violate increases. It is shown that low driving confidence is associated with low frequency of driving violations. It is hypothesized that increased driver confidence gradually releases the tendency to violate. Abstract: It is well known that the tendency to violate is associated with accident involvement. What is paradoxical is that across the early development of driving, violations are increasing at the same time that accident liability is decreasing. It is hypothesised that at the early stage of driving low levels of confidence suppress the tendency to violate. As confidence is increased over time the tendency to violate is gradually released. Consistent with this hypothesis an analysis of several thousand new drivers found that as confidence increased so also did the tendency to violate. Implications for testing and training are considered.