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THE SPEEDING DRIVER: WHO, HOW AND WHY?

Reasons for purchase

6.19 As shown by Table 6.10, price was the single most important reason given for purchase, followed by the car's design and appearance, fuel economy, comfort, and previous knowledge of the make or model. Males and females differed only on the appeal of two of the relatively minor criteria for car purchase, petrol/diesel and special finance deals.

Table 6.10: Crosstabulation of reasons for purchase by sex

Annual Mileage

6.20 Respondents estimated how may miles they had driven 'in the past 12 months'. Responses ranged from 1000 to 80,000 miles. For subsequent analyses they were divided into four bands to give reasonable numbers of drivers characterised as doing Low, Low Medium, High Medium, and High annual car mileages. Males reported higher annual mileages that females (Mean for Males 11,350 miles: Mean for Females 8,150 miles) and Table 6.11 shows females over-represented amongst the Low Mileage and underrepresented amongst the High Mileage drivers (p for chi-square .000)

Table 6.11: Annual mileage in 4 ranges by sex

Engine size

6.21 Table 6.12 shows the percentages of male and female drivers driving cars of different engine sizes from 1 litre (1.0) to over 2 litres (>2.0). The proportions for male and female drivers differ significantly (p for chi-square .000), with more females driving smaller engined cars (up to 1.3 litres; F 42%: M 24%) and more males driving larger cars (1.8 litres and above; M 40%: F 24%).

Table 6.12: Engine Size in 7 ranges by sex

Years driving experience

6.22 The mean number of years driving experience was 23 years, with a modal value of 30 years.

6.23 Table 6.13 shows that over half of drivers (53%) have been driving since before they were 20 years old. Comparing male and female drivers, there is a clear tendency for men to start driving at a younger age than women. Thus, 60% of males had started driving at the age of 20 or younger compared with 45% of females.

Table 6.13: Age at which male and female drivers started to drive

6.24 Looking at the current age of drivers and the age that respondents started to drive suggests that people are learning to drive at a younger age. As Table 6.14 shows, older respondents are much less likely to have started driving at an early age.

Table 6.14: Age at which respondents started to drive by current age

Driving and Work

6.25 Amongst the 62% of male drivers and 58% of female drivers in employment (Table 6.5) there is no statistically significant difference in the proportions of males and females who commute by car. Table 6.15 shows three-quarters of both males and females commuting by car daily. Males are somewhat more likely to drive during rush hours - perhaps due to the greater preponderance of part-time employment amongst female workers, some of them working odd or unsocial hours. And there is a substantial difference in the proportions driving as part of their work, with twice as many males (39%) as females (18%) driving as part of their work 'most days' and two-thirds of female car drivers in work 'Never' doing so. Even so, amongst Scottish drivers in employment almost 1 in 5 of the females and 2 in 5 of the males drive 'as part of' their work on 'most days'.

Table 6.15: Driving in connection with work, by sex

Frequency of use of seven road types

6.26 Respondents were shown photographs of seven different common types of road. All the photographs had been taken during daylight hours and showed roads with no, or free-flowing, traffic.

6.27 The road types were as follows:

• Picture 1 - A six-lane motorway with hard shoulder and central reservation (P1: Motorway).
• Picture 2 - A four-lane dual carriageway with central reservation but no hard shoulder (P2: Dual Carriageway).
• Picture 3 - A four-lane suburban residential road (P3: Wide Suburban ).
• Picture 4 - A two-lane main road in town with parked cars near houses and shops (P4: Main Road in Town).
• Picture 5 - A wide two-lane residential road with some parked cars (P5: Wide Residential Street).
• Picture 6 - A narrow residential street leading to a T-junction with cars parked on both sides (P6: Narrow Residential Street).
• Picture 7 - An open two-lane country road with no other traffic visible (P7: Rural A road).

6.28 The photographs are reproduced at Appendix E.

6.29 During the course of the interview respondents were asked a number of questions about these roads - what they thought the speed limit was, how fast they drove on them, the likelihood of getting caught if speeding - but to establish a baseline of usage and familiarity they were first asked 'How often do you drive on roads like these?'. Table 6.16 shows the distribution of responses for each road type separately for male and female drivers.

6.30 For each road type the male and female distributions were compared using the chi-square statistic and Table 6.16 gives the p values for these comparisons (ns = 'not statistically significant'). Overall, male drivers drove more frequently on motorways than females, but for dual carriageways the differences were not significant. Amongst Scottish drivers 1 in 20 males (5%) and 1 in 6 females (16%) said they 'Never' drove on motorways. More male drivers drove frequently on single-carriageway rural A roads. Between 77% (F: P4) and 84% (M: P5, P6) said they drove on the urban and suburban road types once a week or more often.

Table 6.16: How often drive on 7 road types by sex

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