What our driving says about us (pt. 1)

The US has 250 million passenger vehicles and 196 million registered and licensed drivers, making it the largest passenger vehicle market in the world. Add to that, nearly 4 million miles of highways and you get a nation with lots of drive. With this information, provided by the US Bureau of Transit and the Federal Highway Administration, Harmony has decided to let you know just what gives us that drive. We have recently discovered a book, written by Tom Vanderbilt, "Traffic, why we drive the way we do." We found it to be worthy of a series of post that will hopefully enlighten drivers about ourselves and our driving convictions.

We start with the influence of personality traits. Do you feel that "My hurry is more important than your hurry?" Does driving sometimes become a survival mission, leaving common courtesy behind? Bouts of road rage can erupt as we spend more and more time on the road. We are becoming a nation of self-absorbed drivers! Author, Tom Vanderbilt, says "driving is the most complex everyday thing we do in our lives." Citing research of the complex web of psychological, physical and technical factors that explain how traffic works and how our thought processes operate, that lead to what our driving says about us. It would seem we find it hard to communicate while driving. Turning away from verbal skills, we rely on the horn and gestures to reveal our thoughts. "We struggle to stay human" says Vanderbilt, we strip down our identities, "traffic is a place where no one knows your name" he [Vanderbilt] says. "Hiding" in our safety glass and alloy enclosures, we tend to do a lot of things in our cars- it is even our favorite crying place.

Drivers who take advantage of this anonymity, may become more aggressive and riskier than others, believing that it's just another vehicle on the the road, after all you will never see them again. "Because you don't know the driver in the other vehicle and will likely never see them again, the normal constraints of life are left behind" says Vanderbilt. " Take away human identity and human contact and we act inhuman." Interesting, can this apply to frustration? let's find out.
Do you get frustrated when you see another line moving faster, than the one you are in? The book says it is part of an illusion. While we wait patiently in a "slow moving" line and others are getting "ahead" of us, we get the feeling we are "losing out" while we wait anxiously to move forward. This is the reason drivers change lanes in heavy traffic so often. A traffic jam can throw off our perception, as the vehicles in the other lane pass, we conclude that the other lane is moving faster, when in most cases it isn't. Therefore, we become frustrated, due to the illusion.

Good stuff so far. Next week we will look at emotions, who honks more men or women, parking and when lanes reduce. Please, if you have not signed up to be a follower of this blog or if you have friends or family that need this information do so now and spread the word. Harmony on the Highways is committed to improving highway safety and hope you get the opportunity to attend one of our classes soon.

Thanks for reading and keep cool out there, someone may be more angry than you today!