Effect of driver's personal characteristics on traffic accidents in Tabuk city in Saudi Arabia

• Autor(a) principal: Issa,Yazan
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Journal of Transport Literature
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S2238-10312016000300025
• topic: Traffic Safety; Traffic Accidents; Driver’s Age; Regulations; Driving Experience

AbstractTraffic accidents are a major problem in developing countries. Saudi Arabia is no exception to this worldwide dilemma. In Saudi Arabia a high incidence of road accidents has been recorded in the last several years due to various factors. The aim of this paper is to examine what factors contribute to road accidents in the study area; and to evaluate statistically the effect of certain driver’s personal characteristics on road accidents. It is found that young drivers (less than 30 years) are involved in around 60% of the accidents and more than 80% of the accidents related to human factors. Contrary to expectation, higher driving experience and higher educational level involved in more accidents. The findings have shown the variables that had significant relationships with accidents in the city and those that did not have significance. Among the significant variables was age of the driver and his educational level. It appears that young drivers are highly participating in traffic accidents with less responsibility. The responsibility of accidents decreases with the high educated drivers. Conclusions were drawn as to deficiencies in driver training in Saudi Arabia and inadequacies of supervision by the law enforcement agents. The findings suggest a need for intensive efforts to be undertaken in Tabuk city to raise public awareness of road safety issues and to educate drivers in safe driving practices.