PAPER #86 - Aggressive driving - a comparison between Romanian and French drivers.

Aggressive driving is becoming an increasingly important topic, as the number of driving aggression incidents have increased. Aggressive driving is taken into consideration as a potentially important factor that could lead to the escalation of traffic accidents, and thus leading to more severe consequences. Aggressive driving is usually understood as any driving behavior directed towards harming another road user (physically or verbally). The aim of this study was to analyze and compare driving aggression in two samples (Romanian and French) and to investigate its role in predicting self-reported speeding. Two samples were used for this study: a Romanian one comprising 88 young drivers (18- 25 years, M = 22.5; SD = 1.91, and 69% women) having 3.5 years of driving experience (SD = 2.1) and a French one comprising 87 young drivers (M = 21.6; SD = 2.25) with 3 years of driving experience (SD = 2). All participants answered an online questionnaire on driving anger (Driving Anger Expression Inventory, DAX) and on self-reported speeding behavior. Results showed significant differences between Romanian and French drivers on all the three main factors of DAX, Romanian drivers obtaining higher values. Furthermore, our analysis indicated that the some of the DAX factors represent good predictors of selfreported speeding behavior among our samples. Our results seem to indicate that within the Romanian sample, driving anger could represent an important predictor of speeding. It is noteworthy to observe that young Romanians drivers have reported higher values on all DAX factors. These results could be used in order to increase road users' safety and potentially reduce the number of traffic accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]