Exploring influences on the intention of motorcyclists to drink and ride: An investigation in a fourth-tier city of China

Abstract

Objective

The analysis of motorcyclists’ intention to drink and ride can help reduce the possibility of accidents caused by the relevant behavior of motorcyclists. The main objectives of this study are to identify important factors in motorcyclists’ intention to drink and ride and to make some recommendations that could effectively reduce their riding intention after drinking.

Methods

To explore the effects of demographic and psychological variables on motorcyclists’ behavioral intention to drink and ride, a questionnaire based on the extended theory of planned behavior was designed. Two hundred and five fully completed questionnaires were collected through a survey in Shaoguan, China. A hierarchical regression model was used to analyze observed data.

Results

The final hierarchical regression model explained 37.5% of the variance in intention to drink and ride. While initial tests showed that gender, marital status and age influenced some TPB variables, gender was the only demographic variable found to be significant on the riding intention after drinking alcohol in the hierarchical regression analysis. Among the psychological factors quantified by the extended theory of planned behavior, all factors had significant effects on intention except for risk perception, and subjective norms were the most influential factor.

Conclusions

The extended theory of planned behavior can be well used to examine the factors that influence motorcyclists’ intention to drink and ride. A more nuanced understanding of these factors can be found in the results.

Keywords:

• Motorcyclists
• drink and ride intention
• the theory of planning behavior
• descriptive norms
• moral norms
• risk perception
• road traffic safety

Additional information

Funding

This research was sponsored by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. U1611461).