Self-Assessed Driving Skills and Risky Driver Behaviour Among Young Drivers: A Cross-Sectional Study
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.840269
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Summary
This cross-sectional study investigates the relationship between self-assessed driving skills and risky driving behaviors among young drivers (aged 18–25), a demographic significantly overrepresented in traffic fatalities and injuries. The research addresses the critical period of novice driving, where actual skills develop alongside self-perceptions of safety and competence. The authors aim to determine how age and driving experience influence self-evaluated perceptual-motor skills (vehicle handling) and safety skills (caution, rule adherence), and how these self-assessments correlate with aberrant driving behaviors. The study utilized a stratified random sample of 1,058 drivers from the Finnish driving license register. Participants completed the Driver Skill Inventory (DSI) to assess perceptual-motor and safety skills, and the Driver Behaviour Questionnaire (DBQ) to report errors, lapses, ordinary violations, and aggressive violations. Statistical analyses, including MANOVA and correlation tests, examined the effects of sex, age, and lifetime mileage on these variables. Results revealed distinct sex differences: women reported higher safety skills and more lapses, while men reported higher perceptual-motor skills and more aggressive and ordinary violations. As driving experience increased, perceptual-motor skills rose and safety skills declined for both sexes, though this trend was more pronounced in men. Consequently, a "safety orientation" score (safety skills minus perceptual-motor skills) decreased with experience, indicating that experienced drivers became more confident in vehicle handling but less focused on safety precautions. Correlation analyses showed that perceptual-motor skills were positively associated with violations but negatively associated with errors and lapses. Conversely, safety skills were negatively correlated with all types of aberrant behaviors. Notably, the negative correlation between safety skills and violations strengthened with increased driving experience, suggesting that safety orientation becomes increasingly crucial for preventing risky behavior as drivers gain competence. The findings highlight that the imbalance between growing confidence in vehicle handling and declining safety orientation contributes to risky driving among young drivers, particularly males. The study concludes that driving experience strongly influences both driving style and self-perception, underscoring the importance of the early years of driving in establishing long-term safety habits. The results suggest that interventions targeting young drivers should focus not only on improving technical skills but also on maintaining a strong safety orientation to counteract the tendency toward aggressive and ordinary violations as confidence grows.
Key finding
Self-assessed perceptual-motor skills increased with driving experience and correlated positively with violations, while safety skills decreased with experience and correlated negatively with all aberrant driving behaviors.
Methodology
survey
Sample size: 1058
Provenance
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| Stage | Outcome | Tool | Model | Prompt | Attempts | Completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| verify | success | — | — | — | 2 | 2026-06-10 |
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Topics
Ranked by relevance to this paper. Hover a topic for its definition.
- novice drivers
- sex gender
- decision making risk perception
- motorcyclist skill
- older drivers
- human error taxonomy
Information type
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- Empirical Findings: observational prevalence