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CHAPTER SIX DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS
6.1 Changing drivers' speeding behaviour is a difficult but important challenge for those working in road safety. The beliefs, values and norms which encourage people to speed are widely held, and, for some drivers, strongly entrenched. In particular, beliefs in one's superiority as a driver, an illusory sense of control, and the view that speeding is a normative behaviour all contribute to and legitimise speeding. Given the powerful influence of such beliefs and perceptions, it has been recognised that strategies to reduce speeding should include not only externally-focused measures (such as enforcement and road engineering) but also internally-focused measures - that is, they should seek to address the psychological mechanisms which motivate drivers to speed.
6.2 The Theory of Planned Behaviour provides a useful model for identifying and understanding these mechanisms. Previous applications of the model to speeding behaviour suggest that it is effective both in predicting speeding and in identifying the specific attitudinal and other factors which contribute to speeding (eg. Parker et al, 1992; Stradling & Parker, 1996; Parker et al, 1995). Although the potential of the TPB to assist in the design of behaviour change interventions, as well as in the prediction of behaviour, has been noted (eg. Parker et al, 1996), few studies have assessed the effectiveness of interventions based on the TPB. The strategy of the Foolsspeed campaign was to use the Theory of Planned Behaviour model, together with insights from previous applications of the model, to design a media-based intervention which would influence speeding by targeting the key determinants of speeding: attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioural control. This current study and the previous longitudinal evaluation of the Foolsspeed campaign (Stead et al, 2002) suggest that the TPB provides a useful framework for designing and planning theoretically rigorous road safety interventions.
6.3 Foolsspeed was designed for a general adult driving population, with a core target of male drivers and drivers in non-manual jobs, groups known to have a higher incidence of speeding. It was decided that in order to increase drivers' identification and engagement with the advertising, a shock-horror approach would be eschewed in favour of a low-key realistic style depicting everyday driving scenarios. Fear-arousing messages are successful in gaining audience attention, but there is a risk that advertising which portrays extreme threats is either avoided after initial viewing because it is too distressing, or is discounted by viewers as unrealistic, not personally relevant, and lacking in credibility (Hastings et al 2004). It was hoped that a more empathetic and credible style of road safety advertising (Slater, 1999) would prove equally, if not more, effective in engaging audiences.
6.4 The results reported here and in the previous longitudinal survey evaluation report provide strong support for the approach adopted in the Foolsspeed campaign. When evaluated in the survey against communication measures - awareness, recall, identification, comprehension of message, liking, emotional engagement and so forth - the Foolsspeed campaign demonstrated that it is possible to create memorable and involving advertising without using graphic and fear-inducing images. The campaign generated high levels of spontaneous awareness and prompted recall for a social advertising campaign of moderate media spend (£1.8m over three to four years) Both the longitudinal evaluation survey data and the qualitative data reported here that respondents understood the adverts' intended messages, identified to varying extents with the scenarios and behaviours depicted, and were engaged by them to reassess their own feelings about driving and driving behaviour. Encouragingly, drivers who reported the most frequent speeding behaviour often displayed the strongest levels of identification and were most strongly challenged by the ads to reassess their own driving behaviour.
6.5 The longitudinal survey evaluation report found that when evaluated in terms of impact on TPB measures, however, a more mixed picture emerged (Stead et al, 2002; Stead et al, 2005). There were significant changes (in an anti-speeding direction) over the campaign period in the three attitudinal components - composite Attitude towards the Behaviour, composite Positive Affective Beliefs and composite Negative Affective Beliefs. These changes were nearly always significantly associated with awareness of the Mirror ad - ie. they did not occur in those who did not see the Mirror ad - providing reasonable support for the conclusion that the Mirror ad had a favourable effect on Attitudes and affective beliefs about speeding. Less encouragingly, there was no evidence that desired changes occurred in composite Subjective Norms or composite Perceived Behavioural Control over the campaign period. Minor changes did occur in the items which make up these two components, but these were either short-lived or not always in the desired anti-speeding direction. There appears, at best, only weak evidence that awareness of the Friends and Family ad had an effect on subjective norms, and no evidence that awareness of the Simon Says ad had an effect on Perceived Behavioural Control.
6.6 There are a number of possible explanations for these results. It is possible that the Mirror ad was conceptually stronger (and more persuasive) than the Friends and Family and Simon Says ads, with the result that the ad generated higher initial recall and had a greater impact on the attitudinal components it was designed to influence. The Mirror ad was also the earliest of the three ads to be screened, so may have benefited from prolonged and cumulative exposure effects. In turn, the Friends and Family ad and Simon Says ad may have been conceptually weaker in how they addressed and challenged their respective components, Subjective Norms ad Perceived Behavioural Control. In addition, it may be that Subjective Norms and Perceived Behavioural Control are less easy to operationalise in communication terms, or are less susceptible to change, by communications means alone, than Attitudes. Both components arguably have an external dimension: Subjective Norms potentially comprise both the respondent's perceptions of what significant others feel and what these significant others do actually feel, while Perceived Behavioural Control comprises both internal control factors (for example, feelings of frustration when sticking to the speed limit) and external control factors (for example, direct pressure from the traffic environment) (Conner & Sparks, 1995).
6.7 The qualitative study reported here examined recall of and reactions to both the Foolsspeed Doppelganger ad and to the campaign as a whole. The study is much smaller in scale than the longitudinal survey evaluation, and clearly uses a different methodology (focus groups). Nonetheless it was felt that the study provided a valuable opportunity not only to assess Doppelganger but also to provide retrospective of the whole campaign - in particular, to explore aspects of the campaign which it would be difficult to examine quantitatively, such as perceived linkages between the adverts - and potentially to explain and elaborate on some of the survey findings through qualitative methods.
6.8 It is apparent from this study that the Doppelganger ad had both strengths and weaknesses. Whilst drivers generally failed to initially recognise the stress-free driving message, on closer examination this message theme was identified and many felt that it was less stressful to drive in an unhurried and unpressurised way, and also the reverse, that impatient driving could often be counterproductive. This suggests that there is some potential in messages designed to foster positive beliefs about the benefits of driving better, as well as beliefs about the consequences of speeding, subjective norms in relation to speeding, and perceived control over speeding.
6.9 However, for a number of reasons, the concept did not seem to have been translated into advertising as effectively as it might. Firstly, the "smooth", "polished" style of the ad, combined with the decision not to use any dialogue or voice-over, seemed to distance viewers from the ad and to have made it difficult to engage with the events or characters. Overall, the ad seemed to have been too subtle, and to have represented too much of a departure from conventional road safety advertising (it is notable that the Foolsspeed ads which most closely mimic conventional road safety ads by culminating in dramatic near misses were more engaging). This was exacerbated by the necessary lack of eventfulness in an ad whose main focus was the uneventfulness of stress-free, unhurried driving. Creating engaging advertising around the idea of stress-free driving was always going to be challenging, but in hindsight it is possible that the advert may have been more engaging had it used the sort of dialogue and characterisation deployed in other Foolsspeed ads to help viewers get inside the heads of the drivers and to identify with them. It is also possible that it was particularly challenging to translate the Affective Beliefs construct into advertising compared to, for example, the construct of Attitude.
6.10 Taking the campaign as a whole, this too appears to have had strengths and weaknesses. The focus groups support the longitudinal survey evaluation data in finding that the Mirror ad in particular was effective in triggering self-reflection and challenging drivers' complacency about their driving ability and risk-taking. Simon Says and Friends and Family also, to a lesser extent, triggered drivers to project themselves into the depicted scenarios and to question and reflect on their own driving. Encouragingly, it was frequent speeders who tended to see themselves most strongly in the ads and, often, to feel most challenged by them. Again, this supports the longitudinal survey evaluation data.
6.11 That said, the research also found weaknesses in the ads which potentially lessened their impact. In Friends and Family the driving behaviour was seen as too reckless and selfish, which hindered identification, and in Simon Says respondents did not always empathise with a driver who was seen as somewhat anxious and weak-willed, even though they recognised the driving scenarios shown as very real ones. Moreover, in each of the three original TPB ads the speeding message was not necessarily the strongest message which respondents took from the ad. In each case, other messages - pay attention, respect others, don't be distracted, don't be harassed by other drivers - were being picked up. Given that these are worthwhile messages in themselves and are obviously related to speeding, this is not necessarily a weakness, but it does suggest that the core speeding message was somewhat diluted. There was also something of a mismatch between the proposition encapsulated in the logo - 'speeding is foolish' - and the broader themes of 'look at yourself as a driver' and 'take responsibility for how you drive' which respondents themselves identified as unifying features of the campaign.
6.12 A number of recommendations for future campaigns emerge from the research. Firstly, there does seem to be merit in the realistic approach used in the three earlier ads, and to a lesser extent in the Doppelganger ad. The combination of everyday driving behaviours, "average" characters and 'Scottishness' seems to have been a powerful one, evincing feelings of recognition and identification.
6.13 Secondly, there also seems to be merit in the decision throughout the campaign to avoid dramatic accidents and graphic imagery in favour of less dramatic but more plausible consequences of speeding. Flying in the face of conventional road safety advertising approaches and, particularly, the trend towards ever more emotionally shocking advertising, was always going to be a risky strategy. Despite this, the Foolsspeed ads appear to have stood up well in communication terms, suggesting that it is possible to create engaging advertising without using these approaches. More fundamentally, there are hints from this research that this sort of approach may not only foster stronger identification but may also encourage deeper self-reflection than more graphic advertising. Although our research did not set out specifically to explore this, and further research would be needed to examine it more thoroughly, it seemed that response to more graphic road safety advertising was often voyeuristic and vicarious; in comparison, despite their relative uneventfulness, the Foolsspeed ads seem to have genuinely made drivers think about their driving, almost in face of their protests that the ads were insufficiently hard-hitting.
6.14 Nonetheless, it was still apparent that those Foolsspeed ads which were more dramatic, albeit within the context of a campaign which was strongly grounded in realism and everyday driving, were still more effective and engaging than the less dramatic ads (Friends and Family and Doppelganger). This suggests that ads may still need to portray or imply dramatic consequences and to evoke some kind of emotional response in order to jolt drivers into reflecting meaningfully on their own driving behaviour. In other words, future campaigns should combine a degree of drama and emotion with realism.
6.15 Finally, the Foolsspeed campaign lends support to the use of theory to underpin road safety advertising campaign. Substantial effort was made, particularly in the first three ads, to translate Theory of Planned Behaviour constructs into advertising which would not only work in communication terms but would also relate closely to the three main determinants of speeding intentions and behaviour - Attitudes, Subjective Norms and Perceived Behavioural Control. As already discussed, not all ads were equally effective, and some of the TPB constructs are arguably harder to translate into convincing advertising than others. Nonetheless, the campaign demonstrates that it is possible to design convincing ads around these constructs. Qualitative market research, of the sort used in the pretesting phase, can act as a useful bridge between theory and practice.
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