What exactly makes a safe driver?

This question was posed to the NRSPP by one of our partners. Many of us focus on what makes an unsafe driver, working to identify their risky behaviours and avoid them. However, we often overlook that there are also good behaviours we should give our attention to – habits that make safe drivers. Employers should look for these traits, or help develop them; and of course, growing these habits will be beneficial for everyone and improve their driver safety.

On top of that, this week is National Road Safety Week (NRSW). NRSW is an initiative by Safer Australian Roads and Highways (SARAH) Group that takes place each year. Through this program, NRSW brings road safety organisations and Government together to shine a light on the great impact of road trauma, and interventions to reduce this.

Approximately 1200 lives are lost on Australian roads every year, with a further 44,000 being seriously injured. Road trauma is also the most significant killer of Australian children under 15 years old, and the second-biggest cause of death for 15-24 year olds. Unfortunately, these numbers are increasing each year… but we can prevent this if we Drive So Others Survive!

Be sure to take the Pledge to be a safer driver at National Road Safety Week 2020.

In response, the NRSPP, in collaboration with one of our partners, Griffith University Work Occupational Resilience Centre (WORC), has just released a “Safe and Unsafe Drivers” package, a collection of three user-friendly documents outlining the behaviours of safe and unsafe drivers. Masters students from Griffith University WORC were provided this question to explore, generating the content for these informative Fact Sheets, Infographics and more.

We would like to acknowledge the researchers Winny Yip, Dr. Darren Wishart and Daniell Barrett for developing this paper for NRSPP and its partners. We hope you enjoy it!

You can find the package “Safe and Unsafe Drivers” here:

 

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