International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion
ISSN: 1745-7300 (Print) 1745-7319 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/nics20
Influence of professional drivers’ personality traits on road traffic safety: case study Snežana Živković, Vesna Nikolić & Mirko Markič To cite this article: Snežana Živković, Vesna Nikolić & Mirko Markič (2015) Influence of professional drivers’ personality traits on road traffic safety: case study, International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion, 22:2, 100-110, DOI: 10.1080/17457300.2013.843571 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17457300.2013.843571
Published online: 23 Oct 2013.
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Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=nics20 Download by: [University of Nebraska, Lincoln]
Date: 05 November 2015, At: 23:38
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion, 2015 Vol. 22, No. 2, 100–110, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17457300.2013.843571
Influence of professional drivers’ personality traits on road traffic safety: case study Snezana Zivkovi ca*, Vesna Nikolica and Mirko Markicb a
Faculty of Occupational Safety in Ni s, University of Ni s, Ni s, Republic of Serbia; bFaculty of Management Koper, University of Primorska, Koper, Republic of Slovenia
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
(Received 6 June 2013; accepted 9 September 2013) The purpose of this paper is to present basic elements of the research directed at identifying and determining the personality traits of professional drivers that affect safe, secure and enjoyable ride on public roads. A quantitative method has been used here, whereas data were acquired from a questionnaire based on a sample of 59 professional drivers. Determining personality traits of professional drivers that are in correlation with a safe and pleasant ride on the roads has been enabled by applying the five-factor model of personality (‘Big Five’) and the Personality Inventory NEO-PI. From these results it was concluded that safe operation of the vehicle in traffic involves the successful ‘conduct’ of oneself, which recognises the importance of certain personality traits of professional drivers for traffic safety and the need for appropriate professional selection in the case of employment of professional drivers. Research results implicate development of educational programmes aimed at achieving harmony of psychological, physical and sensory health, that is, programmes for permanent informing, educating and training professional drivers for defensive driving. The research opens the way for new research tasks that should help in creating a specific structure of curricula that can be used in a variety of transportation companies and enterprises to improve general and public safety. Keywords: accidents; personal traits; professional drivers; road traffic; safety; survey
Introduction Road traffic has contributed significantly to the overall development of civilisation and, in fact, represents one of its motivating processes. The level of development and general safety of every state is measured by the degree of traffic safety management (Jacobs, Aeron-Thomas, & Astrop, 2000; van Beeck, Borsboom, & Mackenbach, 1990). By developing society, especially with technical and technological achievements and improving the means of transportation, a network of roads is developed, but, unfortunately, new risks and hazards in transport are generated that way (Lund & Aaro, 2004). Each society is obliged and responsible for developing and improving traffic safety system that protects both human safety and safety of natural and material goods (Jacobs & Sayer, 1983; Lee, 2008). The main problem in that process is determining and establishing the boundaries of unfavourable subjective and objective factors that are causally linked in a certain chain, in particular traffic conditions, or in relation to traffic, they can create hazardous situations/accidents where there can be injuries, human and material losses (McKenna, 1982). Traffic accidents are, in fact, complex phenomena caused by a series of situational (objective) and individual (subjective) variables (Ranney, Harbluk, & Noy, 2002). Objective variables are the impact of roads, technical characteristics *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] Ó 2013 Taylor & Francis
of vehicles, circumstances, social norms and so on. Subjective variables that affect professional behaviour and driver efficiency are social maturity level, work experience, physical characteristics, level of general and specific abilities as well as personal characteristics and traits (Wahlberg, 2006). The quality of the driver’s professional behaviour implies a balance between objective and situational variables. Interactivity and connectivity of these variables further influence and complicate the process of causing traffic accidents (Dewer & Olson, 2002). In the early twentieth century, a group of English psychologists (Farmer & Chambers, 1926; Greenwood & Woods, 1919) set the following hypotheses about the origin of accidents: accidents happen by chance (accidents are rare and random events); previous accidents lead to emergence of other future accidents; whether one becomes immune, or old accidents sensitise new accidents; people are different in the so-called ‘tendencies for accidents.’ The objective merit of these hypotheses was checked by comparing actual empirical distribution of traffic accidents with each of the assumed theoretical distribution. The obtained results indicate that the third hypothesis of ‘tendencies for accidents’ is the most correct, because its statistical model is a negative binomial distribution; however, it best suits the empirical distribution of traffic accidents.
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion Factors that make people prone to accidents can be divided into three groups (Dewer & Olson, 2002): (1) factors that are unchangeable during a long period, and they are basic in situations where accidents can happen (so-called stable factors), such as physical, mental and psychological characteristics; (2) factors that are gradually changing over time: general education, age, work experience; and (3) factors that are subject to constant change: personal mood, indisposition to work, lack of concentration. Shaw and Sichel (1971) claim that the influence of personality has a crucial role: ‘personality has a strong and decisive impact on human disaster so that it can make someone prone to accidents despite of their skill and physical abilities . . . not even experience can always compensate for the defective personality.’ According to the authors, extrovert and neurotic drivers, as well as those with aggressive characteristics, usually have a significantly large number of accidents. Other authors as well (e.g. Allahyari et al., 2008; Elander, West, & French, 1993; Lajunen, 2001) highlight the importance of personality traits of professional drivers on traffic safety. Drivers need emotional stability, calmness, responsibility, proper habits, motor skills and especially knowledge (Simpson, 2003). It is certain that a group with greater risk for traffic accidents is made of immature personalities prone to regressive immature reactions, as well as persons with amoral character which is expressed in traffic relations, then, people who are too impulsive and excited, and opposite to them those who are ponderous and inert. Inferior persons with unresolved internal conflicts are particularly at risk in traffic, because they can express signs of neurotic behaviour while dealing with their inner tension, which is manifested as impulsive, affective and aggressive tendencies (H€akkinen, 1979; Ysander & Birger, 1976). Starting from these and other previous similar research results, our research task has been limited to the research of the influence of personality traits of professional drivers on road safety, or to put it more precisely, the influence of personality traits of professional bus drivers on safe bus driving in public transport. Having analysed the works of the representatives of the predisposition theory or the theory of individual susceptibility to injuries (Chambers & Yule, 1941; Farmer & Chambers, 1939; Greenwood & Woods, 1919) led us to reflect on personality structure, and more precisely to observe traits or characteristics that may affect safety of professional drivers at their workplace (while operating a vehicle in traffic). A driver’s occupation, in comparison with other professions, requires well-timed engagement of mental and physical functions. At the same time, absence of these functions can cause fatal consequences. Professional drivers are exposed to the effects of different driving speeds and limitations of their own mental and
101
physical abilities in order to master space more safely and to notice potential danger in time. A man can compensate for his limited capabilities of sensory apparatus by engaging his personality and mental functions in order to master traffic situations successfully (Lajunen, Karola, & Summala, 1997). When describing a personality, the existence of certain features or characteristics or the amount to which they are expressed is usually stated. Theories that emphasise personality structure do not address the origin of features, but their manifestation and intensity, which in a way exceeds subjective views of psychoanalysts, behaviourists or humanists. More recently, the idea of features as elements of structural personality prevails, and research has been based on finding and identifying the main factors that would cover the entire realm of personality. The basis for this has been language, that is, many linguistic expressions that describe and interpret personality. The five-factor model of personality by American psychologists Costa and McCrae has been developed on these assumptions and it singled out five factors or personality traits that have been generally confirmed in many studies (Clarke & Robertson, 2005; Costa & McCrae, 1990). The five main factors (Extraversion, Neuroticism, Likeability, Agreeableness and Openness) or five domains, as the authors call them, also include five specific traits, and in that way describe personality in the simplest and the most accurate way. The five-factor model of personality has been successfully applied in selecting workers in many occupations. In this study, NEO PI-R personality inventory has been used to test professional bus drivers. They were divided into groups based on the number of traffic accidents and the faults in them and they were observed according to the five personality traits measured by the NEO PI-R personality inventory.
Research aim and hypotheses The main objective of this study is to determine the level of expressing individual personality traits (according to the five-factor model) in professional drivers, and determine the correlation between certain personality traits and the tendency to cause traffic accidents.
Hypotheses H1: There is a strong correlation between certain personality traits of professional bus drivers and the tendency to cause and participate in road traffic accidents. H2: There is a significant correlation between the trait of Conscientiousness and the number of traffic accidents, in the sense that conscientious drivers cause and participate in fewer number of accidents.
102
S. Zivkovi c et al.
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
H3: There is a strong correlation between the trait of Likeability and the number of traffic accidents, in the sense that less likeable, more aggressive drivers cause more accidents. H4: There is a correlation between the general attitude to job satisfaction and some of the five personality traits. H5: There is a correlation between general job satisfaction and the number of traffic accidents. After this section of literature review, stating research objectives and the formation of hypotheses, the second section will be about methodology, the third section will be ‘results and discussion’ and the last section will give the conclusions.
Methodology Practically speaking, we have chosen a quantitative research method by which we have used a case study approach, as described by Easterby-Smith, Thorpe, and Lowe (2002), to explore a company deeply.
Subject sample and course of study The sample is composed of 59 professional bus drivers. The sample has been selected randomly from professional drivers in a traffic and transport company in Serbia. All the drivers have a driver’s license in the D category and have at least five years of experience. Their position implies working almost all day, including working at night. They operate on long distance and international lines. The study was conducted in 2010. Respondents were given questionnaires that they filled in later. The questionnaires were not anonymous so that objective information about accidents could later be obtained based on the name and surname. Data on each driver’s accidents were obtained from a travel service where they had been noted. Data on accidents in the past five years were obtained and used. All violations where some drivers participated were recorded, and the offences for which the driver personally was responsible were further separated. The administration recorded those offences in the records on damage compensation, which should be covered by the driver if he was responsible for the accident.
Methods, techniques, instruments and statistical procedures In the descriptive research method that is considered to be the most appropriate to the object of our study, we have used the following instruments:
A questionnaire on biographical data relating to age, years of work experience, marital status, social and economic status and general attitude to job satisfaction was prepared. The questionnaire was not anonymous due to the fact that accurate and objective information about each driver’s accidents could later be collected. The NEO PI-R personality inventory was constructed by Costa and McCrae (1992) based on the five-factor model of personality. This inventory was used in the shortened version of 44 items, because it was assumed that the complete questionnaire would be too long and non-motivating for drivers. Personality Inventory NEO PI-R was constructed in the form of Lickert scale, so for each statement the respondent could determine the level of accuracy from 1 to 5. Items are related to descriptions of his own personality and cover the five factors of personality: Extraversion, Neuroticism, Openness, Likeability and Conscientiousness. The Breyfield–Roth general job satisfaction scale (Guzina, 1980) is also set in the form of the Lickert scale. It consists of claims related to different aspects of work that form the general attitude to job satisfaction. The following statistical procedures were applied to data analysis: calculation of basic statistics: frequency, range, arithmetic mean and standard deviation in the basic categories of age, work experience, education level, socio-economic status and traffic accidents data; t-test of significance of differences between the arithmetic mean of the two groups; t-test in the additional item analysis to determine the significance of differences between groups in the indicative items; regressive analysis – for determining the relationship between personality traits and guilt in traffic accidents. Results Descriptive review of the drivers’ basic biographical data (1) Age – drivers are of different ages ranging from 29 to 63. The average age is about 49. Most drivers (about two-thirds) are aged between 40 and 56. Based on these data, this sample of respondents can be said to consist of older drivers. (2) Work experience – the range of experience is wide and it makes 35 years. Minimum work experience is a period of 5 years whereas the longest work experience is 40 years. The average work experience of this sample is 27 years. It can be said that experienced drivers, those who have optimum years of experience for driving safely, have been tested.
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion
103
Table 1. Student’s t-test results for the group that had no accidents and the group of drivers with at least one accident. Variable
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
Extraversion Likeability Conscientiousness Neuroticism Openness Job satisfaction
AS I gr
AS II gr
SD I gr
SD II gr
t-test
df
p
29.11 39.00 36.85 22.59 35.96 68.61
25.80 36.79 36.23 21.69 35.13 67.68
3.21 4.23 5.01 3.87 5.85 9.16
4.60 5.37 5.71 4.07 5.89 10.83
3.151 1.700 0.441 0.850 0.532 0.354
56 54 56 54 55 57
0.003 0.095 0.661 0.399 0.597 0.725
(3) Qualifications – most respondents have secondary education (77%). One respondent has a college degree, while seven respondents or 11% have primary education. (4) Social and economic status – 90% of the respondents are of the middle social and economic status. Five respondents are of lower status, while only one is of higher social and economic status. Descriptive overview of the number of drivers’ accidents Traffic accidents in this study have been divided according to guilt and severity into two categories: minor and major. (1) The total number of accidents in this sample of 59 drivers is 62 accidents, which means 1.05 accidents per driver. However, quite a large number of drivers (47%) are those who did not have any accident and 24% of them are those with only one accident during the period of five years. (2) Thirty-seven per cent of the total number of drivers committed traffic accidents with guilt. Most of them (17%) had one wrongful accident. (3) As far as difficult accidents are concerned, five drivers, or 8.5% of the total number of drivers, were to blame, while in most serious accidents six more drivers or 10.2% were involved without any fault of theirs.
Results of testing the significance of differences between groups of drivers in terms of personality traits and job satisfaction by using Student’s t-test Based on a derived variable that distinguishes drivers according to the total number of accidents, drivers are divided into: Group I – where drivers without a single accident are classified, Group II – where drivers with at least one accident are classified. Student’s t-test in this case (Table 1) is 3.151, on the level of significance of p < 0.01, emphasises extraversion as a significant and important personality trait that
separates the drivers who had no accidents at all and those who experienced them. Other personality traits do not stand out as significantly different between the two groups, and it also goes for the general attitude of job satisfaction. The first group of drivers who did not experience a single accident for the past five years, regardless of guilt, are, as a rule, sociable and friendly drivers, with more interpersonal contacts and emotional relations. More introvert drivers, who have more frequently been involved in accidents, are more withdrawn, less talkative and active. Extravert drivers are stronger, radiate energy and are frequently on the move, prefer stimulating circumstances and excitement (Figure 1). Since most of their work consists of such situations that require distributed attention, frequent contacts with people, fast work pace and strength, it seems that more open drivers are safer in traffic. The results of item analysis, i.e. testing significance of differences by using Student’s t-test (Table 2) on items that represent extraversion, are important in separating drivers who are more likely to be involved in accidents than those who are not. These eight items make extraversion and three items are significant at levels
ISSN: 1745-7300 (Print) 1745-7319 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/nics20
Influence of professional drivers’ personality traits on road traffic safety: case study Snežana Živković, Vesna Nikolić & Mirko Markič To cite this article: Snežana Živković, Vesna Nikolić & Mirko Markič (2015) Influence of professional drivers’ personality traits on road traffic safety: case study, International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion, 22:2, 100-110, DOI: 10.1080/17457300.2013.843571 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17457300.2013.843571
Published online: 23 Oct 2013.
Submit your article to this journal
Article views: 80
View related articles
View Crossmark data
Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=nics20 Download by: [University of Nebraska, Lincoln]
Date: 05 November 2015, At: 23:38
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion, 2015 Vol. 22, No. 2, 100–110, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17457300.2013.843571
Influence of professional drivers’ personality traits on road traffic safety: case study Snezana Zivkovi ca*, Vesna Nikolica and Mirko Markicb a
Faculty of Occupational Safety in Ni s, University of Ni s, Ni s, Republic of Serbia; bFaculty of Management Koper, University of Primorska, Koper, Republic of Slovenia
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
(Received 6 June 2013; accepted 9 September 2013) The purpose of this paper is to present basic elements of the research directed at identifying and determining the personality traits of professional drivers that affect safe, secure and enjoyable ride on public roads. A quantitative method has been used here, whereas data were acquired from a questionnaire based on a sample of 59 professional drivers. Determining personality traits of professional drivers that are in correlation with a safe and pleasant ride on the roads has been enabled by applying the five-factor model of personality (‘Big Five’) and the Personality Inventory NEO-PI. From these results it was concluded that safe operation of the vehicle in traffic involves the successful ‘conduct’ of oneself, which recognises the importance of certain personality traits of professional drivers for traffic safety and the need for appropriate professional selection in the case of employment of professional drivers. Research results implicate development of educational programmes aimed at achieving harmony of psychological, physical and sensory health, that is, programmes for permanent informing, educating and training professional drivers for defensive driving. The research opens the way for new research tasks that should help in creating a specific structure of curricula that can be used in a variety of transportation companies and enterprises to improve general and public safety. Keywords: accidents; personal traits; professional drivers; road traffic; safety; survey
Introduction Road traffic has contributed significantly to the overall development of civilisation and, in fact, represents one of its motivating processes. The level of development and general safety of every state is measured by the degree of traffic safety management (Jacobs, Aeron-Thomas, & Astrop, 2000; van Beeck, Borsboom, & Mackenbach, 1990). By developing society, especially with technical and technological achievements and improving the means of transportation, a network of roads is developed, but, unfortunately, new risks and hazards in transport are generated that way (Lund & Aaro, 2004). Each society is obliged and responsible for developing and improving traffic safety system that protects both human safety and safety of natural and material goods (Jacobs & Sayer, 1983; Lee, 2008). The main problem in that process is determining and establishing the boundaries of unfavourable subjective and objective factors that are causally linked in a certain chain, in particular traffic conditions, or in relation to traffic, they can create hazardous situations/accidents where there can be injuries, human and material losses (McKenna, 1982). Traffic accidents are, in fact, complex phenomena caused by a series of situational (objective) and individual (subjective) variables (Ranney, Harbluk, & Noy, 2002). Objective variables are the impact of roads, technical characteristics *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] Ó 2013 Taylor & Francis
of vehicles, circumstances, social norms and so on. Subjective variables that affect professional behaviour and driver efficiency are social maturity level, work experience, physical characteristics, level of general and specific abilities as well as personal characteristics and traits (Wahlberg, 2006). The quality of the driver’s professional behaviour implies a balance between objective and situational variables. Interactivity and connectivity of these variables further influence and complicate the process of causing traffic accidents (Dewer & Olson, 2002). In the early twentieth century, a group of English psychologists (Farmer & Chambers, 1926; Greenwood & Woods, 1919) set the following hypotheses about the origin of accidents: accidents happen by chance (accidents are rare and random events); previous accidents lead to emergence of other future accidents; whether one becomes immune, or old accidents sensitise new accidents; people are different in the so-called ‘tendencies for accidents.’ The objective merit of these hypotheses was checked by comparing actual empirical distribution of traffic accidents with each of the assumed theoretical distribution. The obtained results indicate that the third hypothesis of ‘tendencies for accidents’ is the most correct, because its statistical model is a negative binomial distribution; however, it best suits the empirical distribution of traffic accidents.
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion Factors that make people prone to accidents can be divided into three groups (Dewer & Olson, 2002): (1) factors that are unchangeable during a long period, and they are basic in situations where accidents can happen (so-called stable factors), such as physical, mental and psychological characteristics; (2) factors that are gradually changing over time: general education, age, work experience; and (3) factors that are subject to constant change: personal mood, indisposition to work, lack of concentration. Shaw and Sichel (1971) claim that the influence of personality has a crucial role: ‘personality has a strong and decisive impact on human disaster so that it can make someone prone to accidents despite of their skill and physical abilities . . . not even experience can always compensate for the defective personality.’ According to the authors, extrovert and neurotic drivers, as well as those with aggressive characteristics, usually have a significantly large number of accidents. Other authors as well (e.g. Allahyari et al., 2008; Elander, West, & French, 1993; Lajunen, 2001) highlight the importance of personality traits of professional drivers on traffic safety. Drivers need emotional stability, calmness, responsibility, proper habits, motor skills and especially knowledge (Simpson, 2003). It is certain that a group with greater risk for traffic accidents is made of immature personalities prone to regressive immature reactions, as well as persons with amoral character which is expressed in traffic relations, then, people who are too impulsive and excited, and opposite to them those who are ponderous and inert. Inferior persons with unresolved internal conflicts are particularly at risk in traffic, because they can express signs of neurotic behaviour while dealing with their inner tension, which is manifested as impulsive, affective and aggressive tendencies (H€akkinen, 1979; Ysander & Birger, 1976). Starting from these and other previous similar research results, our research task has been limited to the research of the influence of personality traits of professional drivers on road safety, or to put it more precisely, the influence of personality traits of professional bus drivers on safe bus driving in public transport. Having analysed the works of the representatives of the predisposition theory or the theory of individual susceptibility to injuries (Chambers & Yule, 1941; Farmer & Chambers, 1939; Greenwood & Woods, 1919) led us to reflect on personality structure, and more precisely to observe traits or characteristics that may affect safety of professional drivers at their workplace (while operating a vehicle in traffic). A driver’s occupation, in comparison with other professions, requires well-timed engagement of mental and physical functions. At the same time, absence of these functions can cause fatal consequences. Professional drivers are exposed to the effects of different driving speeds and limitations of their own mental and
101
physical abilities in order to master space more safely and to notice potential danger in time. A man can compensate for his limited capabilities of sensory apparatus by engaging his personality and mental functions in order to master traffic situations successfully (Lajunen, Karola, & Summala, 1997). When describing a personality, the existence of certain features or characteristics or the amount to which they are expressed is usually stated. Theories that emphasise personality structure do not address the origin of features, but their manifestation and intensity, which in a way exceeds subjective views of psychoanalysts, behaviourists or humanists. More recently, the idea of features as elements of structural personality prevails, and research has been based on finding and identifying the main factors that would cover the entire realm of personality. The basis for this has been language, that is, many linguistic expressions that describe and interpret personality. The five-factor model of personality by American psychologists Costa and McCrae has been developed on these assumptions and it singled out five factors or personality traits that have been generally confirmed in many studies (Clarke & Robertson, 2005; Costa & McCrae, 1990). The five main factors (Extraversion, Neuroticism, Likeability, Agreeableness and Openness) or five domains, as the authors call them, also include five specific traits, and in that way describe personality in the simplest and the most accurate way. The five-factor model of personality has been successfully applied in selecting workers in many occupations. In this study, NEO PI-R personality inventory has been used to test professional bus drivers. They were divided into groups based on the number of traffic accidents and the faults in them and they were observed according to the five personality traits measured by the NEO PI-R personality inventory.
Research aim and hypotheses The main objective of this study is to determine the level of expressing individual personality traits (according to the five-factor model) in professional drivers, and determine the correlation between certain personality traits and the tendency to cause traffic accidents.
Hypotheses H1: There is a strong correlation between certain personality traits of professional bus drivers and the tendency to cause and participate in road traffic accidents. H2: There is a significant correlation between the trait of Conscientiousness and the number of traffic accidents, in the sense that conscientious drivers cause and participate in fewer number of accidents.
102
S. Zivkovi c et al.
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
H3: There is a strong correlation between the trait of Likeability and the number of traffic accidents, in the sense that less likeable, more aggressive drivers cause more accidents. H4: There is a correlation between the general attitude to job satisfaction and some of the five personality traits. H5: There is a correlation between general job satisfaction and the number of traffic accidents. After this section of literature review, stating research objectives and the formation of hypotheses, the second section will be about methodology, the third section will be ‘results and discussion’ and the last section will give the conclusions.
Methodology Practically speaking, we have chosen a quantitative research method by which we have used a case study approach, as described by Easterby-Smith, Thorpe, and Lowe (2002), to explore a company deeply.
Subject sample and course of study The sample is composed of 59 professional bus drivers. The sample has been selected randomly from professional drivers in a traffic and transport company in Serbia. All the drivers have a driver’s license in the D category and have at least five years of experience. Their position implies working almost all day, including working at night. They operate on long distance and international lines. The study was conducted in 2010. Respondents were given questionnaires that they filled in later. The questionnaires were not anonymous so that objective information about accidents could later be obtained based on the name and surname. Data on each driver’s accidents were obtained from a travel service where they had been noted. Data on accidents in the past five years were obtained and used. All violations where some drivers participated were recorded, and the offences for which the driver personally was responsible were further separated. The administration recorded those offences in the records on damage compensation, which should be covered by the driver if he was responsible for the accident.
Methods, techniques, instruments and statistical procedures In the descriptive research method that is considered to be the most appropriate to the object of our study, we have used the following instruments:
A questionnaire on biographical data relating to age, years of work experience, marital status, social and economic status and general attitude to job satisfaction was prepared. The questionnaire was not anonymous due to the fact that accurate and objective information about each driver’s accidents could later be collected. The NEO PI-R personality inventory was constructed by Costa and McCrae (1992) based on the five-factor model of personality. This inventory was used in the shortened version of 44 items, because it was assumed that the complete questionnaire would be too long and non-motivating for drivers. Personality Inventory NEO PI-R was constructed in the form of Lickert scale, so for each statement the respondent could determine the level of accuracy from 1 to 5. Items are related to descriptions of his own personality and cover the five factors of personality: Extraversion, Neuroticism, Openness, Likeability and Conscientiousness. The Breyfield–Roth general job satisfaction scale (Guzina, 1980) is also set in the form of the Lickert scale. It consists of claims related to different aspects of work that form the general attitude to job satisfaction. The following statistical procedures were applied to data analysis: calculation of basic statistics: frequency, range, arithmetic mean and standard deviation in the basic categories of age, work experience, education level, socio-economic status and traffic accidents data; t-test of significance of differences between the arithmetic mean of the two groups; t-test in the additional item analysis to determine the significance of differences between groups in the indicative items; regressive analysis – for determining the relationship between personality traits and guilt in traffic accidents. Results Descriptive review of the drivers’ basic biographical data (1) Age – drivers are of different ages ranging from 29 to 63. The average age is about 49. Most drivers (about two-thirds) are aged between 40 and 56. Based on these data, this sample of respondents can be said to consist of older drivers. (2) Work experience – the range of experience is wide and it makes 35 years. Minimum work experience is a period of 5 years whereas the longest work experience is 40 years. The average work experience of this sample is 27 years. It can be said that experienced drivers, those who have optimum years of experience for driving safely, have been tested.
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion
103
Table 1. Student’s t-test results for the group that had no accidents and the group of drivers with at least one accident. Variable
Downloaded by [University of Nebraska, Lincoln] at 23:38 05 November 2015
Extraversion Likeability Conscientiousness Neuroticism Openness Job satisfaction
AS I gr
AS II gr
SD I gr
SD II gr
t-test
df
p
29.11 39.00 36.85 22.59 35.96 68.61
25.80 36.79 36.23 21.69 35.13 67.68
3.21 4.23 5.01 3.87 5.85 9.16
4.60 5.37 5.71 4.07 5.89 10.83
3.151 1.700 0.441 0.850 0.532 0.354
56 54 56 54 55 57
0.003 0.095 0.661 0.399 0.597 0.725
(3) Qualifications – most respondents have secondary education (77%). One respondent has a college degree, while seven respondents or 11% have primary education. (4) Social and economic status – 90% of the respondents are of the middle social and economic status. Five respondents are of lower status, while only one is of higher social and economic status. Descriptive overview of the number of drivers’ accidents Traffic accidents in this study have been divided according to guilt and severity into two categories: minor and major. (1) The total number of accidents in this sample of 59 drivers is 62 accidents, which means 1.05 accidents per driver. However, quite a large number of drivers (47%) are those who did not have any accident and 24% of them are those with only one accident during the period of five years. (2) Thirty-seven per cent of the total number of drivers committed traffic accidents with guilt. Most of them (17%) had one wrongful accident. (3) As far as difficult accidents are concerned, five drivers, or 8.5% of the total number of drivers, were to blame, while in most serious accidents six more drivers or 10.2% were involved without any fault of theirs.
Results of testing the significance of differences between groups of drivers in terms of personality traits and job satisfaction by using Student’s t-test Based on a derived variable that distinguishes drivers according to the total number of accidents, drivers are divided into: Group I – where drivers without a single accident are classified, Group II – where drivers with at least one accident are classified. Student’s t-test in this case (Table 1) is 3.151, on the level of significance of p < 0.01, emphasises extraversion as a significant and important personality trait that
separates the drivers who had no accidents at all and those who experienced them. Other personality traits do not stand out as significantly different between the two groups, and it also goes for the general attitude of job satisfaction. The first group of drivers who did not experience a single accident for the past five years, regardless of guilt, are, as a rule, sociable and friendly drivers, with more interpersonal contacts and emotional relations. More introvert drivers, who have more frequently been involved in accidents, are more withdrawn, less talkative and active. Extravert drivers are stronger, radiate energy and are frequently on the move, prefer stimulating circumstances and excitement (Figure 1). Since most of their work consists of such situations that require distributed attention, frequent contacts with people, fast work pace and strength, it seems that more open drivers are safer in traffic. The results of item analysis, i.e. testing significance of differences by using Student’s t-test (Table 2) on items that represent extraversion, are important in separating drivers who are more likely to be involved in accidents than those who are not. These eight items make extraversion and three items are significant at levels
