Knowledge about Crash Risk Factors and Self-Reported Driving Behavior Exploratory Analysis on Multi-State Teen Driver Survey By Lisa Minjares-Kyle, M.S., CPPE, CPST Associate Transportation Researcher Texas A&M Transportation Institute This presentation is covering the findings from a large teen survey that was facilitated to the peer-to-peer teen traffic safety initiative known as Teens in the Driver Seat. I will present some of the highlights and interesting findings but we are only truly scratching the surface of this data and hope to get even more information which I will talk about later in my presentation. The survey is approved through the institutional review board

Car crashes are the leading cause of death for teens and young adults. Why Are We Here? Car crashes are the leading cause of death for teens and young adults. Annually we lose over 2800 teens a year in fatal crashes and an additional tens of thousands are injured. To put this teen fatalities into perspective, it would be equivalent to… 2,820 teens died in 2016 and thousands are injured in car crashes every year. Equivalent to a school bus full of teens crashing every week for a year.

The Fundamental Reason Along with these additional 5 risks: Driver inexperience is the #1 cause for teen crashes..

Nighttime/Drowsy Driving Top Teen Driving Risks Distractions Nighttime/Drowsy Driving Speeding/Racing Low Seat Belt Use Impaired Driving But we know, in combination with experience, there are five main factors involved in teen crashes which are list (Source: National Safety Council)

Overview/Methodology Demographics Knowledge of top risk factors Traffic background License status Driver education history Crash/citation history Self-reported driving behaviors within past 30 days This survey was distributed to schools within their resource kit who signed up to become part of the Teens in the Driver Seat Program between 2007 and 2016. Distribution of the survey was voluntary but schools were encouraged to complete the surveys and were given points towards a reward program sponsored by State Farm. Schools who did agree to distribute the survey were then asked to target 90% of their driving population or a minimum of 300 students across all age groups to help achieve a representative sample. The survey was designed to obtain demographic information including age, gender, grade classification and geographic data including their school and city. The second portion of the survey asked them to list the five most common factors that contribute to teenagers involvement in car crashes. This is an open-ended answer which we will discuss later in the presentation. The third portion of the survey focuses on traffic safety including their licensing status (permit, provisional, unrestricted or none) and the kind of driver education course they’ve completed. Lastly the survey asked them to self-report on the frequency they’ve enagaged in 12 behaviors within the past 30 days on a scale of none, some (1-5 times) or a lot (more than 5 times). Questions in this section included questions on both driver and passenger behaviors on a range of risky driver behaviors such as distractions, riding with other teens, night time driving, no seat belts, etc. which we will discuss later in the presentation.

Survey Population This sample includes 109, 266 surveys from 11 states from 2007-2016. The state that has the highest representation is Texas with over 88,000 surveys followed by Georgia with nearly 11,000, Connecticut with over 3,000 and North Carolina with 3,000. the remaining states ranged between 1,789 – 11 respectively.

Demographics 17.6% Of teens reported receiving an on-road driving test before receiving a license. FM L P U N

Talked on a Cell Phone or Texted while Driving “Some” Texted while Driving “A Lot” More than 5 times in past 30 days Between 1-5 times in past 30 days Cell-Phone Talking – A lot

Driven or Ridden without wearing a Seat Belt “A Lot” wearing a Seat Belt “Some” More than 5 times in past 30 days Between 1-5 times in past 30 days Ridden without a seat belt

Driven 10 MPH Over Speed Limit “A Lot” More than 5 times in past 30 days

Driven after drinking Driven after drinking alcohol “A Lot” alcohol “Never” More than 5 times in past 30 days

Driven or Ridden with Teens without an Adult “A Lot” More than 5 times in past 30 days

Driven After 10 PM without an Adult “A Lot” More than 5 times in past 30 days

Top 10 Reported Risk Factors Drinking Text Phone Seat Belt Drug Speed Talking Distraction Inattention Music

Bottom 10 Reported Risk Factors Careless Sleep Eating Friends Smoking Tired Passengers Light Road Weather

F Gender Differences M

Conclusions Most Frequent Risky Behaviors reported Distractions related to cell-phone use Speeding Riding with teens Driving after 10 pm Significant lack of Risk identification for Night time risk factors Teen passengers Significant gender differences for Texting, passengers, speeding and seatbelts Limitations Random effect for states outside of Texas Small sampling size Conclusions Limitations Next Steps

Lisa Minjares-Kyle, M.S., CPST, CPPE Phone: 713-613-9211 E-mail: l-minjares@tti.tamu.edu Thank you!