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THE SPEEDING DRIVER: WHO, HOW AND WHY?

CHAPTER NINE ROAD SAFETY ADVERTISING AND ENGINEERING MEASURES

Publicity measures

9.1 This Section reports material from the survey on drivers' recollection of a range of recent road safety publicity campaigns in Scotland. Respondents were first asked if they were 'Aware of any road safety advertising aimed at drivers?'. Table 9.1 gives the proportions answering 'Yes' by age group separately for male and female drivers.

Table 9.1: Percentage 'aware of any road safety advertising aimed at drivers' by age group and gender

9.2 Overall, the figures for male and female drivers were not significantly different, with 73% of males and 70% of females answering 'Yes'. For both males and females there was a significant age group effect, with the average 'Yes' responses for males aged 70+ years and for females aged 60+ years significantly adrift of the proportions for all younger age groups.

9.3 Table 9.2 gives the figures for unprompted, spontaneous mention of a number of recent anti-speeding campaigns both national and regional.

Table 9.2: Unprompted recall of anti-speeding campaigns

9.4 Of this set, 'Kill Your Speed - Not A Child' proved to have been the most memorable, with 1 in 5 (20%) of Scottish drivers giving unprompted recall of this campaign.

9.5 Particular attention was paid to the SRSC's national Foolsspeed Campaign, and its associated trio of television advertisements based on research using the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Parker et al 1996) and which has recently been the subject of a thorough evaluation for the Scottish Executive by the Centre for Social Marketing at Strathclyde University (Stead et al, 2002). The series of three advertisements attempted to address the three core theory components; attitude ('Mirror'), subjective norm ('Family and Friends') and perceived behavioural control ('Simon Says'). Table 9.3 summarises the results for unprompted recall and prompted recognition of the campaign and its three components.

Table 9.3: Recall and recognition of Foolsspeed campaign and its components

9.6 The Foolsspeed campaign achieved the highest overall unprompted recall of any of the campaigns, being volunteered by 1 in 4 respondents (24%), more than the 1 in 5 who spontaneously recalled 'Kill Your Speed, Not A Child' (Table 6.58). Of the three components the most recently televised, at the time of the survey, 'Simon Says' achieved the highest unprompted recall, from 1 in 6 drivers (17%). When shown a still image from each television advertisement half of drivers (51%) recognised Family & Friends, two-thirds (64%) recognised Mirror, and 4 out of 5 recognised Simon Says, testifying further to the impact of this research-based intervention.

ENGINEERING MEASURES

9.7 This section looks at four anti-speeding engineering measures: crossing patrols - a lollipop man or woman; speed humps or 'sleeping policemen', road narrowing or street gateways, and 20mph speed limits in residential areas; and reports data on the frequency with which respondents said they encountered each and their level of support for each.

9.8 Table 9.4 shows the distribution of the frequency of encounter responses.

Table 9.4: Frequency of encounter with recent anti-speeding engineering measures

9.9 Almost all respondents reported at least some familiarity with crossing patrols, speed bumps and road narrowing, though 1 in 5 (22%) had not come across residential 20mph limits.

9.10 Table 9.5 shows levels of agreement with statements in support of each measure.

Table 9.5 Support for anti-speeding engineering measures

9.11 Support for all measures was strong with 98% in favour of crossing patrols and 87% supporting residential 20mph limits. 1 in 5 (19%) were not in favour of speed bumps and 1 in 4 (24%) did not support road narrowing.

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