Zen 101: Understanding Bad Drivers

Road rage is an overpowering phenomenon – it sneaks up on you quickly and takes over, and it can find its way into the calmest of people. Those who you thought possessed the "Zen Factor". There’s something about bad drivers impairing our journey with their slow driving and mismatching indicators that just makes us see red.

In an attempt to gently lessen the wrath that is so common on our roads, here are some scientific reasons behind why bad drivers are, well, bad. Knowledge is power, and knowing why some people drive as they do, we can work together to keep our heads from exploding over steering wheels across the UK.

The majority of drivers will be aware of the middle-of-the-road driver, and that most of the culprits are older in age. Scientists have discovered that older drivers have a "built-in safety mechanism", to compensate for their gradually declining driving skills.

After a series of assessments involving driving along virtual roads, results concluded that elderly drivers drove slower and more to the middle of the road to make up for their declining driving skills, of which they were aware of. This compensation-motivated behaviour is not restricted to driving only, but in other aspects of life for the elderly too. Of course, this can be annoying for the driver behind who likes to drive 20 miles per hour over the limit, but at least know you know that the oldies have right intentions behind the facade of painstakingly slow driving.

A less obvious culprit of bad driving lies with those who play video games on a regular basis. A recent study found that those who get behind the wheel after a spell in a virtual world are more likely to display signs of road rage, go through red lights and have to claim on their car insurance.

One slightly more surprising reason behind bad driving is those who go out of their way to make themselves especially road-safe. There is research behind the fact that those who feel that they’re in a very secure car can sometimes then go out of their way to increase their risk. Scientists have explained that we aim to maintain our risk at a certain level, and when we feel really safe this can lead to unsafe driving as the driver will feel that with a really safe car they’re able to drive a little erratically to compensate for it. Note Chelsea tractors driving over pavements and barging into merging queues.

So any driver coming out of an MOT with flying colours, in-car technology and side-impact airbags, well you now know the possible reason behind their erratic driving. Apparently there really is such a thing as being too safe.