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A sample of 98 drivers responded to a Swedish version of the UK Driving Anger Scale [UK DAS; [Lajunen, T., Parker, D., Stradling, S.G., 1998. Dimensions of driver anger, aggressive and highway code violations and their mediation by safety orientation in UK drivers. Transport. Res. Part F 1, 107-121]. The results indicated that the Swedish version, like the British original, measures three sources of driver irritation: "progress impeded", "reckless driving", and "direct hostility". Structural equation modelling was used to investigate the relationships between the three sources of self-reported driver irritation, aggressive actions, speed, sex, age, and annual mileage. The models suggested a positive relationship between the amount of driver irritation and frequency of aggressive actions for all three sources of irritation. Female drivers tended to become more irritated than male drivers, while the male drivers tended to act aggressively more often. Surprisingly, drivers who reported that they enjoy fast speeds did not become more irritated than slower drivers when obstructed. The important conclusions are that experienced irritation often leads to openly aggressively actions, and that expression of aggressive behaviours may be a cause of other drivers' feeling of irritation. 

Alcolocks are commercial breath test devices that prevent a motor vehicle from starting when a driver's blood alcohol concentration (BAC) is elevated. This report is an evaluation of the experiences and BAC data from the first use of alcolocks in commercial vehicles as a primary prevention strategy. In most applications, the alcolock is imposed only after an impaired driving conviction. This study, implemented in Sweden, estimates drink driving on a large scale in a variety of commercial vehicles.

Officials from 118 companies were interviewed representing 3689 alcolock-equipped vehicles used by 9614 professional drivers, an 80% compliance rate. In a contrast group of 230 transport businesses without alcolocks the interview compliance rate was 57%. Survey results probed motivation for and experience with alcolocks. Analysis of BAC test patterns showed alcohol consumption among employees through prevalence estimates of drink-driving attempts at the rate of BAC ≥ the legal limit 0.020%.

Before alcolock installation, 64% of the employers suspected alcohol problems among their employees and their motive for installing alcolocks (cost averaged 1700 €/vehicle) was to improve the transport quality. Several companies had technical problems with the alcolocks; but 98% recommended that other companies install alcolocks.

Among 600, heavy vehicles, 0.19% of all starts were prevented by elevated BAC; most during weekends and mornings. Daytime Saturday and Sunday mornings 0.72% of the drivers had elevated BAC.

Conclusions

The prevalence of drink driving among professional drivers is probably similar to that among drivers in general. Alcolocks would improve the safety margin and reduce public risk. Provided that the entire fleet of trucks, buses, and taxis in Sweden had installed alcolocks that would correspond to about half a million drink driving trips being prevented every year.

The first aim of the present study was to examine the factor structure of the traffic locus of control (TLOC)scale in a Swedish sample of drivers. The second aim was to examine if this scale can be used to predict drivers’ speeding behaviour. A sample of Swedish car owners (N= 223) completed a questionnaire including questions based on the traffic locus of control (T-LOC) scale as well as questions about their speeding behaviour. The results showed a five factor solution including own skills, own behaviour, other drivers, vehicle/environment and fate. Own behaviour and vehicle/environment could be used to predict drivers’ speeding behaviour on roads with a 90 km/h speed limit while none of the variables included in the traffic locus of control (T-LOC) scale could be used to predict drivers’ speeding behaviour on roads with a 50 km/h speed limit. On 90 km/h roads own behaviour was positively related to drivers’ speeding behaviour while vehicle/environment was negatively related to their speeding behaviour.

The aim of the present study was to examine if there are any cross cultural differences between Swedish and Turkish drivers’ rating of the variables in the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) with regard to complying with the speed limit. A sample of 219 Swedish and 252 Turkish drivers completed a questionnaire including questions based on the theory of planned behaviour (i.e. regarding attitude, subjective norm,perceived behavioural control, intention and behaviour). The results show that country differences in drivers’ intention to comply with the speed limit as well as their self reported compliance could be explained by differences found in their attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioural control. Furthermore,drivers who live in a country with fewer road traffic fatalities (i.e. Sweden), compared with driverswholive in a country withmore road traffic fatalities (i.e. Turkey),reported amore positive attitude towards complying with the speed limit, a more positive subjective norm, a higher perceived behavioural control, a higher intention and a larger proportion of the time spent complying.