Factors Contributing to Driving Safety in the Trucking Industry

OCCUPATIONAL APPLICATIONS

This study sought to identify factors contributing to preventable road traffic crashes, based on analyses of crash records collected from 18 trucking companies in Japan. Road crashes in the trucking industry were found to be associated with the following factors: penalty points of the driver's license, emotional stability, safety attitudes, delivery area or range, driver workload, and driving experience. In addition to well-known causal factors for driver errors in road transport, these results suggest that managers in a trucking firm should provide drivers with safety-oriented work schedules to control stress and workload. Examples include more frequent breaks (for a shorter duration), particularly for medium- or long-distance drivers, controlling annual driving distance, and training not only for technical skills but also for enhanced safety attitudes and behaviors.

TECHNICAL ABSTRACT

Background: Occupational traffic safety is recognized as one of the most crucial social issues to address in many countries. Yet, causal factors for road crashes involving occupational drivers have not been fully investigated. Purpose: This study sought to identify important factors contributing to safety outcomes of occupational truck drivers in Japan. Methods: A total of 1292 drivers’ road crash and work-related records were collected from 18 trucking companies in Japan. Each record specified individual and task-related attributes and history of road crashes from 2004 to 2006. As individual attributes, each record included age, gender, experience, employment condition, supervisor assessment of fuel-efficient driving, penalty points on driver's license, scores of five personality and attitude factors, and four sensorimotor functions measured by a driver aptitude test. Examples of task-related attributes were vehicle type, delivery, and annual working days. Chi-square tests were used to examine differences between “crash-free” and “crash-involved” drivers for potential contributing factors. Results: Several driver factors contributing to safety performance were identified. For instance, years of occupational driving experience were positively associated with higher levels of traffic safety. Drivers with fewer driver's license penalty points were less likely to have been involved in a road crash. Results also suggested that drivers’ emotional stability and positive safety attitudes are associated with lower involvement in road crashes. In addition to these individual attributes, some task-related factors were identified that may influence the likelihood of crash involvement (e.g., delivery range and annual driving distance). Conclusions: Several driver factors, such as fewer driver's license penalty points, high emotional stability, positive safety attitudes, and reasonable workload, were associated with mitigation of crash risk. This suggests that occupational truck drivers should be provided safety-oriented work schedules and conditions for appropriately controlling workload and training not only for technical skills but also for safety-related attitudes and behaviors.

KEYWORDS:

• Risk-taking behavior
• fuel-efficient driving
• safety attitude
• road traffic crash
• driving safety

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors are grateful to Keiichi Higuchi, President of the National Trucking Business Cooperative, Tokyo, Japan, for his support and cooperation throughout this study. They would like to acknowledge Yukiko Sato and Hidetoshi Furuno of the same organization and managers of trucking companies for their arrangement of the data collection. They grateful to the following persons for variable information and discussion about the aptitude test for driving: Jiro Gyoba, Professor, Tohoku University; Tomoki Ohashi, Professor, Miyagi Gakuin Women's University; and Shinya Yoshida, Professor, Tohoku Gakuin University. Thanks are expressed to Pelle Jørgensen, Technical University of Denmark, and Xiuzhu Gu, Tokyo Institute of Technology, for their insightful comments and language improvement for this study.