An investigation of the relationship between demographic variables, driving behaviour and crash involvement risk of bus drivers: a case study from Iran

Abstract

The aim of this study was to model bus drivers’ crash involvement risk as a function of their demographic factors and driving behaviour. 177 bus drivers completed the bus driver risk index questionnaire. 19.2% of respondents had been involved in at least one at-fault crash during the past 3 years. In addition, age group and having a second job were found to affect the crash involvement rate. Smoker drivers reported significantly lower scores in patient driving and anxious driving factors. Results also indicated that vehicle ownership could improve hazard monitoring and thrill-seeking behaviours of bus drivers. Logistic regression suggested that drivers ≥55 years old are 5.4 times more likely to be involved in crashes, compared with drivers <35 years old. Model results also implied that the odds of crash involvement would decrease by 39% for each one-unit improvement in the scores of hazard monitoring behaviour. Implications are further discussed.

Keywords:

• bus drivers
• bus driver risk index questionnaire
• hazard monitoring
• crash involvement risk

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 The original version of the bus driver risk index (BDRI) contained 59 items in six components including fatigue proneness (11 items), hazard monitoring (14 items), relax driving (9 items), patient driving (12 items), anxious driving (6 items) and thrill seeking (7 items). To select the 29-item questionnaire, a pilot survey with the complete version of the BDRI was conducted and those questions that were ambiguous to the respondent were omitted from the questionnaire. The authors also consulted with some experts from bus agencies in Iran in order to select the most appropriate items.

The modifications of the Persian version were also related to rephrasing and re-wording which were carried out to help the respondents (i.e., Iranian bus drivers) to understand the purpose of the questions.