REARVIEW:The tragic Donegal crash has been quite a jolt to the sense of achievement we all had over reductions in the number of Irish road deaths.
As yet, nobody really knows for sure what happened in Donegal that night, but we do know that there were too many people in one car and that the occupants belonged to one of the highest risk categories, not just here, but in every country in the world.
Studies in Australia show that when carrying two or more passengers, a young driver’s risk of being involved in a fatal collision is over five times higher than travelling alone.
We all know by now that young male drivers are the most at risk when it comes to collisions and fatalities.
But they are also the most likely to take risks.
The natural answer might be to provide more driver training for younger driver’s but it’s often not that simple.
It has been shown in several instances that traditional driver-training programs – that aim to increase vehicle-handling and manoeuvring skills – have previously led to an actual increase in the crash rate of young drivers.
This is believed to be due to associated increases in confidence that result in greater risk taking while driving. There is now a move towards the development of more attitudinal-motivational skills.
Studies of these types of training techniques by Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) show that participants become more aware of hazards, more cautious and, crucially, tend to report greater awareness of the risk.
Rather than teaching our younger drivers how to use what can be a deadly weapon, why not make them more aware of what happens when things go wrong first.
Professor Noel Sheehy, of John Moore University School of Psychology in Liverpool, says that familiarity of a road and conditions can lead to excessive risk taking.
“The more familiar you are with a road, your car and your speed the more cautious you should be about your driving.”
Combining risk taking with inexperience, poor judgement and peer influences can be a lethal mix.
Finding a way to prevent these symptoms of youth could be more difficult that we ever imagined.