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Crossing at a red light: Behaviour of individuals and groups
Abstract
The present study examines the road behaviour of individual pedestrians at an intersection with a traffic signal compared to groups of pedestrians at the same intersection.In total, 1392 pedestrians were unobtrusively observed in an urban setting at a pedestrian street crossing of undivided streets; 842 were female (60.5%) and 550 were male (39.5%). The observations took place between 7:30 and 8:30 in the morning. Chi-square test revealed the males crossed on red more frequently than females. Logistic regression predicting red-light crossing for pedestrians arriving during a red-light phase indicated that, apart from gender, the tendency to cross on red was greater when there were fewer people waiting at the curb, either when a pedestrian arrived, or joining after arrival. The discussion refers to the theoretical explanations concerning the theory of ‘social control’ and to some practical implications of the results, such as using the positive value of social control in media campaigns and adjusting the red light duration in order to encourage people to obey the traffic light.
... Concerning pedestrians' gender, research has consistently indicated that male pedestrians are more likely to cross on red and tend towards higher risk-taking compared with females [45,48,49]. Similar findings were revealed in observational surveys conducted in Israel [50]. ...
... The presence and behavior of other pedestrians also play a role in the individual's decision to cross on red. Research has shown that as the number of pedestrians waiting on the sidewalk increases, the probability of crossing on red decreases [38,49,56]. On the other hand, tendency towards social conformity increases the chance of a pedestrian crossing on red if other pedestrians do so [46,58]. ...
... Thus, the current study aspired to reduce this gap by conducting observations of pedestrian behaviors at typical intersections with BPRs. Furthermore, this study considered a wide range of factors that may influence pedestrians' non-compliance with traffic lights, according to the literature [12,36,38,41,45,49], including pedestrian characteristics, crossing conditions, and the characteristics of infrastructure settings and traffic at the sites observed. Pedestrian behaviors were analyzed in relation to the intersection structure and crossing destination, aiming to contribute to insights into traffic arrangements. ...
Public transport is an integral part of sustainable urban development when its use is promoted by setting bus priority routes (BPRs). BPRs provide clear mobility benefits, but they raise pedestrian safety concerns. In this study, observations were conducted at signalized intersections with two types of BPRs, center-lane and curbside, aiming to characterize pedestrian crossing behaviors, with a particular focus on red-light crossings. We found that at intersections with center-lane BPRs, 30% of pedestrians crossed at least one crosswalk on red, while at another type, 11% crossed on red. Multivariate analyses showed that the risk of crossing on red was substantially higher at intersections with center-lane vs. curbside BPRs; it was also higher among pedestrians crossing to/from the bus stop, males, and young people but lower under the presence of other waiting pedestrians. Furthermore, among pedestrians crossing on red at center-lane BPRs, over 10% did not check the traffic before crossing and another 10% checked the traffic in the wrong direction, thus further increasing the risk. At center-lane BPRs, infrastructure solutions are needed to reduce pedestrian intention to cross on red. Additionally, education and awareness programs for pedestrians should be promoted to emphasize the heightened risk of red-light crossing at intersections with BPRs.
... Concerning social parameters, according to majority of the studies, if a pedestrian perceives other pedestrians waiting at the crosswalk upon his/her arrival, then the chances are high that he/she will wait for green (comply with the signal) to cross the road Rosenbloom, 2009;Wang et al., 2011). But views of existing literature differ on the behavior of a single pedestrian as compared to a group of pedestrians at the crosswalks. ...
... As obtained from the initial model, all parameters except Gender were found to be significant predictors of RLV behavior. Thus a pedestrian's Gender does not affect the signal violation behavior, which is in congruence with some studies (Dommes et al., 2015;, but not with some (Brosseau et al., 2013;Díaz, 2002;Guo et al., 2011;Mukherjee and Mitra, 2017;Ren et al., 2011;Rosenbloom, 2009;Rosenbloom et al., 2004). ...
... The more people a pedestrian perceives to be waiting for green at a crosswalk, the less likely he/she is to violate the signal. This result is in Rosenbloom, 2009;Wang et al., 2011). ...
Disregarding the signal and crossing the road in haste or for other personal motives is a well-established trend seen in signalized crosswalks, particularly among pedestrians in lower-middle income developing countries such as Nepal. At signalized crosswalks, pedestrians are sequentially separated from vehicles (unlike unsignalized crosswalks) due to traffic signals. However, pedestrians’ signal violation especially red-light running can, in unfortunate circumstances, expose them to vehicles that might lead to fatalities. The current study assesses the red light violation behavior of pedestrians at signalized crosswalks in Kathmandu. Binary logistic regression as well as Kaplan-Meier survival analysis have been performed on 1790 pedestrians. The logit model results show that carrying a child/heavy load, crosswalk length, perceived traffic volume, pedestrian crossing speed, number of pedestrians waiting at the crosswalk, group crossing, and the remaining red duration until the green phase significantly affect pedestrians’ decision to commit red light violation or wait until green. This study also introduced a novel variable called perceived volume, which considers fluctuations in traffic flow and quantifies the traffic faced by pedestrians. The survival analysis results show that approximately 35% of the total pedestrians did not even consider waiting for the green signal after arrival (violated immediately). Both logistic regression and survival analysis confirm that pedestrians prefer to wait for green (comply with the signal) when the remaining red phase duration (until the green phase) is below 50 s; pedestrians tend to violate almost instantly when they face a remaining red phase duration of more than 100 s.
... According to recent research that has been enthusiastic in studying the problems relating to pedestrian safety, pedestrian crashes and injuries can be predictable and avoidable using various modern approaches. Pedestrian road crossing activity patterns are potentially responsible for traffic accidents that mostly jeopardize safety (Shaaban et al., 2018;Rosenbloom, 2009). Furthermore, environmental factors such as infrastructure design have been demonstrated to have a high relationship with the likelihood of an accident (Badea et al., 2010). ...
... The authors also revealed that one explanation for violating traffic laws by pedestrians was to save time. So, waiting time at intersections plays a vital role in traffic law violations (Ma et al., 2020;Mukherjee & Mitra, 2019;Brosseau et al., 2013;Rosenbloom et al., 2009) and hence jaywalking. While waiting at those intersections, crowd size (Ma et al., 2020;Dommes et al., 2015;Ren et al., 2011;Priyadarshini & Mitra, 2018;Shaaban et al., 2018) and traffic volume (Ma et al., 2020;Dommes et al., 2015;Zhang et al., 2019) influenced pedestrians' decision of jaywalking. ...
Predominance of jaywalking, heterogeneous traffic condition and mobile phone-induced distractions make pedestrians highly vulnerable to road crashes. Using the Bayesian Belief Network (BBN), this study investigated different predictors associated with jaywalking and mobile phone-induced pedestrian safety hazards at highway intersections in Bangladesh. An interactive framework comprised of a questionnaire and observation study was employed at 32 intersections on national and regional highways. Furthermore, the Chi-square test was used to investigate the relationship between jaywalkers' socioeconomic attributes and risk perception. The study's findings show that gender, jaywalker activities, types of jaywalking, waiting time, and frequency of phone use while jaywalking had the most impact on any jaywalker's risk assessment. Less waiting time at each intersection discourages pedestrians from using their phones and maintains a high-risk perception. Additionally, the driving experience of any age group can increase risk perception. Moreover, women feel more confident crossing the street when they are accompanied.
... This can be explained by the fact that neither drivers nor pedestrians follow the rules of traffic light signalling. Studies have shown that the most common pedestrian offences are illegal crossings during a red-light phase [10][11][12][13][14][15]. Keegan and O'Mahony [16] highlighted in their research that 35% of pedestrians cross against a red light. ...
... Pedestrians who commit illegal road crossings in a group feel that the responsibility for the violation of regulations is divided among other participants in the group, which encourages every pedestrian to ignore the consequences of this behaviour [14]. The findings are in favour of this fact as well. ...
The present research describes the development and validation of a self-reported instrument that measures the determinants of pedestrians’ intention to violate traffic rules, based on the theory of planned behaviour. Moreover, the research deals with the analysis of the predictive validity of an extended theoretical framework of the theory of planned behaviour in relation to pedestrians’ intention to violate. Based on the quota sample, adult pedestrian respondents (n = 383) completed a questionnaire assessing the relevant variables. Valid and reliable scales were developed, and they measure subjective, descriptive, normative, and personal norms, cognitive and affective attitudes, perceived behavioural control, habit formation, and behavioural intention concerning pedestrians’ misdemeanour. Hierarchical regression analysis indicated that all components, except descriptive norms, were significant simultaneous predictors of pedestrians’ intention to violate. The most powerful predictor is the personal norm. Overall, the findings considerably support the concept of the extended theoretical framework of the theory of planned behaviour.
... Specifically, young adults and men have been investigated to be more agreeable to the conception that autonomous vehicles will enhance driver and motorists' safety (Nielsen and Haustein, 2018), have non-existent concerns about the safety of autonomous vehicles in the immediate driving environment (Kyriakidis et al., 2015;Schoettle and Sivak, 2014), and are willing to apply the technology (Smith and Anderson, 2017; Payre et al., 2014). Considering these demographics, they have been related to dangerous motorists' behaviour (Turner and Mcclure, 2003) and dangerous behaviour of pedestrians (Holland and Hill, 2007;Rosenbloom, 2009). All these behaviours are related to the elevated possibility of collision, resulting in the worst road safety consequences. ...
... This research discovers from the existing literature review that young adult males between the ages of 18 and 35 are a primary demographic that reports elevated levels of positive perceptions of the safety of automated vehicle technology. It is important to note that young adult males are more connected to dangerous driving and aggressive road behaviour (Holland and Hill, 2007;Rosenbloom, 2009;Turner and Mcclure, 2003), their widely acknowledged non-negativity aimed at autonomous vehicle safety and early application of autonomous vehicle technology could likely result in an enormous rapid actualization of road transportation safety advantages (Hulse et al., 2018). ...
As the advancement of driverless technology, together with information and communication technology moved at a fast pace, autonomous vehicles have attracted great attention from both industries and academic sectors during the past decades. It is evident that this emerging technology has great potential to improve the pedestrian safety on roads, mitigate traffic congestion, increase fuel efficiency, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, there is limited systematic research into the applications and public perceptions of autonomous vehicles in road transportation. The purpose of this systematic literature review is to synthesise and analyse existing research on the applications, implications, and public perceptions of autonomous vehicles in road transportation system. It is found that autonomous vehicles are the future of road transportation and that the negative perception of humans is rapidly changing towards autonomous vehicles. Moreover, to fully deploy autonomous vehicles in a road transportation system, the existing road transportation infrastructure needs significant improvement. This systematic literature review contributes to the comprehensive knowledge of autonomous vehicles and will assist transportation researchers and urban planners to understand the fundamental and conceptual framework of autonomous vehicle technologies in road transportation systems.
... The previous studies examined the effects of demographic factors on crossing pedestrian behaviour. According to studies, females are more careful than males, such as waiting for a longer time at pedestrian red signals (14) and fewer temporal violations while crossing (8,11,52). The effect of age group was also investigated, showing that pedestrians of higher ages behaved more conservatively at signalized intersections (10) or unsignalized intersections and that younger pedestrians were more likely to attempt dangerous crossings and commit violations (8). ...
... According to the pre-analysis of the variables' significance level, the three types of crossing locations (uncontrolled / marked / illegal) have a very similar effect on pedestrian crossing safety, so they were grouped into one category. This finding is different from the results of two previous studies (42,52). This indicted that Egyptian drivers do not differentiate between pedestrian crossing locations which does not have a forced control device such as speed tables or signal traffics. ...
Pedestrians are the most vulnerable road users in the transportation system. Understanding pedestrian behaviour and road safety culture is critical for improving traffic safety in developing countries. The primary goal of this two-fold study is to provide an investigation of pedestrian behaviour in Egypt, a developing country. The first part of this study validated the applying of Pedestrian Behaviour Scale (PBS) to investigate pedestrian behaviour in Egypt. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was applied on 533 participants to assess the pedestrian’s behavioural factors based on four validated categories: transgressions, lapses, aggressive and positive behaviours. The second part investigated pedestrian crossing behaviour at five different mid-block locations using video recordings. Then, logistic regression models were conducted to investigate pedestrian crossing safety. Males reported more aggressive behaviour than females. Pedestrians previously involved in a collision committed more transgressions and lapses. The presence of forced pedestrian crossing facilities, such as raised pedestrian crossings or traffic signals, significantly reduced the number of unsafe crossings when compared to uncontrolled pedestrian crossings. The aforementioned findings can be used by policymakers to improve road safety programs, create effective traffic safety campaigns, and enact appropriate laws, which could reduce the number of pedestrian-related crashes.
... The reason why men are more likely to have accidents and have high RTIs could be their higher risk of engaging in hazardous behavior (Rosenbloom 2009;Tom and Granié 2011). ...
... The results of the current study showed that young people engage in more unsafe behaviors than the older adult, which was similar to the results of a study by Torquato Steinbakk and Bianchi (2010) and Granié et al. (2013). Age is one of the factors in pedestrians' decision-making to cross, and younger pedestrians are more at risk than older pedestrians (Rosenbloom 2009). ...
Objective:
Pedestrians are one of the most vulnerable users in road traffic injuries (RTIs). The rate of pedestrians' fatality is high in Iran. It is worthwhile to investigate how pedestrians behave. This observational study aimed to investigate pedestrians' unsafe behaviors while crossing.
Methods:
This cross-sectional study examined the behavior of 1095 pedestrians (69.7% men) using videotaping when they crossed at two intersections and three non-intersections on a weekend and two working days in the morning, at noon, and in the evening. The information obtained was classified into 5 domains including adherence to traffic rule, violation, environmental barriers, visibility, and distraction. Data were analyzed using Stata version 17.
Results:
About 60% of the pedestrians ignored the crosswalk and crossed the street wherever they wanted. More than 30% ignored the vehicles passing and crossed the street inattentively. About 60% of the pedestrians committed violations. More than half of pedestrians crossed unsafe crossings diagonally or in a hurry. More than 35% wore dark clothing and had low visibility, and nearly 30% were distracted. Adolescent pedestrians did not adhere traffic rules about 6 times more than the young adult pedestrians. Pedestrians who did not adhere to traffic rules in the morning were significantly more than in the evening. Men committed a violation 1.47 times more than women. The results showed that the pedestrians committed a violation in the morning significantly more than in the evening.
Conclusion:
The occurrence of pedestrians' unsafe behaviors in Maku was high. Unsafe behaviors were high among men and young adult pedestrians. Therefore, it's essential to implement educational interventions via different media as well as environmental interventions by different organizations to improve safe behavior among pedestrians.
... A significant proportion of these casualties occur during road crossings [2]. Factors contributing to such incidents include misjudging the time required to cross, low visibility conditions, and visual obstructions that prevent the timely detection of approaching vehicles [3][4][5]. Enhancing auditory cues emitted by vehicles has been proposed as a potential strategy to mitigate these risks, particularly in the context of typically quieter electric vehicles (EVs) [6] and external Human-Machine Interfaces (eHMIs) for automated vehicles [7][8][9][10]. ...
The growing adoption of electric vehicles, known for their quieter operation compared to internal combustion engine vehicles, raises concerns about their detectability, particularly for vulnerable road users. To address this, regulations mandate the inclusion of exterior sound signals for electric vehicles, specifying minimum sound pressure levels at low speeds. These synthetic exterior sounds are often used in noisy urban environments, creating the challenge of enhancing detectability without introducing excessive noise annoyance. This study investigates the design of synthetic exterior sound signals that balance high noticeability with low annoyance. An audiovisual experiment with 14 participants was conducted using 15 virtual reality scenarios featuring a passing car. The scenarios included various sound signals, such as pure, intermittent, and complex tones at different frequencies. Two baseline cases, a diesel engine and only tyre noise, were also tested. Participants rated sounds for annoyance, noticeability, and informativeness using 11-point ICBEN scales. The findings highlight how psychoacoustic sound quality metrics predict annoyance ratings better than conventional sound metrics, providing insight into optimising sound design for electric vehicles. By improving pedestrian safety while minimising noise pollution, this research supports the development of effective and user-friendly exterior sound standards for electric vehicles.
... Based on the current literature, it cannot yet be definitively stated whether there are gender differences in the risk propensity of child pedestrians when making road-crossing decisions. Most of previous studies stated that teen and younger males have higher levels of risk-taking compared to females, and this tendency grows with age (Granié, 2009;Herrero-Fernández et al., 2016;Rosenbloom, 2009;Tom and Granié, 2011;Useche et al., 2021;Wang et al., 2018). While none of these studies specifically focused on road safety learning abilities as a function of gender, the observed performance differences between genders were often attributed to factors such as the study context, the child's background, and intrinsic characteristics like spatial abilities and a propensity to follow rules. ...
As road crashes are the leading cause of mortality among children, effective road safety education is vital. This study aims to evaluate an innovative educational method using fully immersive Virtual Reality (VR) technology to teach children how to cross the road safely and explores potential differences in learning outcomes based on gender. The proposed training system integrates individual VR sessions with collective VR-supported lessons. The experiment involved 74 participants (41 females, age range 9-11), divided into control and treated groups. All participants underwent two full-immersive VR tests, with a two-week interval, during which they faced 4 pedestrian crossing scenarios, including both signalized and unsignalized crossings. The treated group, after one week from the first VR test, took part in a VR-supported lesson which illustrated the most common errors and the rules of good pedestrian behavior. Participants from the treated group showed significant improvements in various behaviors: reduced red traffic light violations, less running while crossing, and better judgment of vehicular gaps when crossing. No significant gender-based differences in learning outcomes were directly linked to the treatment, except for the running behavior. The proposed method, designed to be a scalable solution that can be easily implemented in school settings, can effectively train children in road safety, leading to significant improvements in crossing behavior regardless of gender.
... Their studies revealed that younger pedestrians and males are more likely to engage in risky behaviors, such as crossing streets without waiting for the traffic lights as compared to older pedestrians and females. Rosenbloom (2009) examined pedestrians' compliance with traffic signals and found that perceived risk and social norms are significant factors influencing pedestrian behavior. These findings underscore the importance of considering demographic and psychosocial factors when designing pedestrian safety measures. ...
... Socio-cultural variables such as the degree to which the country is considered "developed" (Hamed, 2001), marital status, education, income and employment status (Guéguen & Pichot, 2001;LaScala et al., 2000) are found to be related to pedestrian behaviour. According to social psychology (Rosenbloom, 2009), circumstantial variables, such as the presence of other pedestrians on the street, serves to reduce cautiousness. In a similar way, the presence of other passengers, together with age and gender affect the likelihood to travel without a ticket (Bucciol et al., 2013). ...
The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly affected the consumption patterns of cultural goods. Using novel data from a consumer survey conducted in January 2022 across 14 countries, we address two key issues. First, we provide a descriptive analysis of changes in the consumption of four cultural goods—music, films and series, games, and books—focusing on shifts between legal and illegal consumption. Second, we reassess the relationship between digital piracy and legal sales, with a particular emphasis on age differences. Our findings reveal that among those who engaged in illegal consumption during the pandemic, 6–8% were new pirates, primarily individuals who experienced income reductions and increased time at home due to the shift to remote work or schooling. Among adults, these disruptions were linked to a decline in legal sales of music and games. In contrast, the displacement of legal audiovisual consumption was observed only among adults who continued working in person. Minors displayed different patterns: for them, illegal consumption was negatively associated with legal book consumption but positively linked to legal audiovisual consumption.
... [69]. The two participants were co-located but not in a group setting, to avoid group influence [48,51,52]. It compares three eHMI concepts: on the vehicle, within the surrounding infrastructure, and on the pedestrian themselves. ...
Recent research has increasingly focused on how autonomous vehicles (AVs) communicate with pedestrians in complex traffic situations involving multiple vehicles and pedestrians. VR is emerging as an effective tool to simulate these multi-entity scenarios, offering a safe and controlled study environment. Despite its growing use, there is a lack of thorough investigation into the effectiveness of these VR simulations, leaving a notable gap in documented insights and lessons. This research undertook a retrospective analysis of two distinct VR-based studies: one focusing on multiple AV scenarios (N=32) and the other on multiple pedestrian scenarios (N=25). Central to our examination are the participants' sense of presence and their crossing behaviour. The findings highlighted key factors that either enhance or diminish the sense of presence in each simulation, providing considerations for future improvements. Furthermore, they underscore the influence of controlled scenarios on crossing behaviour and interactions with AVs, advocating for the exploration of more natural and interactive simulations that better reflect real-world AV and pedestrian dynamics. Through this study, we set a groundwork for advancing VR simulators to study complex interactions between AVs and pedestrians.
... Previous studies reported contradictory findings regarding the role of gender on pedestrian illegal crossing behavior. While some studies found males to exhibit higher violation rates than women (Guo et al., 2011;Jamali-Dolatabad et al., 2019;Poó et al., 2018;Rosenbloom, 2009), other studies (Dommes et al., 2015;Ren et al., 2011) have failed to identify significant distinctions between the two genders. Lipovac et al. (2013) found that unlike women, installing countdown timers on pedestrian signals caused a significant increase in the number of men violators in the first four seconds of the red cycle, indicating the moderating role of gender on the effectiveness of countdown timers on pedestrian compliance with the traffic light. ...
... For example, accepting shorter gaps between vehicles to cross, or not looking at upcoming traffic. Group size exerts some form of social force over individual pedestrians [54]. It also affects pedestrian flow and speed. ...
This paper addresses the often overlooked issue of fairness in the autonomous driving domain, particularly in vision-based perception and prediction systems, which play a pivotal role in the overall functioning of Autonomous Vehicles (AVs). We focus our analysis on biases present in some of the most commonly used visual datasets for training person and vehicle detection systems. We introduce an annotation methodology and a specialised annotation tool, both designed to annotate protected attributes of agents in visual datasets. We validate our methodology through an inter-rater agreement analysis and provide the distribution of attributes across all datasets. These include annotations for the attributes age, sex, skin tone, group, and means of transport for more than 90K people, as well as vehicle type, colour, and car type for over 50K vehicles. Generally, diversity is very low for most attributes, with some groups, such as children, wheelchair users, or personal mobility vehicle users, being extremely underrepresented in the analysed datasets. The study contributes significantly to efforts to consider fairness in the evaluation of perception and prediction systems for AVs. This paper follows reproducibility principles. The annotation tool, scripts and the annotated attributes can be accessed publicly at https://github.com/ec-jrc/humaint_annotator.
... Pawlowski et al. (2008) demonstrated that male pedestrians were more likely to cross a road when vehicles were on the crossing. Other studies reported a greater propensity for males to cross on red pedestrian lights (Rosenbloom, 2009;Tom & Granié, 2011). Traffic-related mortality is also higher among male than female pedestrians (Joly et al., 1992). ...
Sexual selection theory predicts that males, especially in their prime reproductive years, are more risk-prone than females. Risk-taking is a means to convey mate quality or “good genes” to members of the opposite sex or competitive ability to members of the same sex. Therefore, risk-taking should be more common in the presence of potential mates (intersexual selection or female choice) or in the presence of male competitors (intrasexual selection or male–male competition). Risk-taking can also be situated within a life history/ecological perspective, according to which environmental unpredictability promotes more present-oriented and risky behavioral strategies. Therefore, people living in areas of low socioeconomic status are predicted to be more risk-prone. We conducted an observational study on risk-taking in two everyday situations: crossing the road and riding a bicycle. A total of 1,030 participants, 906 road-crossers and 124 cyclists, were recorded at various intersections throughout Perth, Western Australia. In line with predictions from sexual selection, males were more likely to cross a road in high-risk conditions and to ride a bicycle without wearing a helmet. These behaviors were also most common in younger adult males. Female and male onlookers had no effect on male risk-taking, which suggests that norm adherence is a more powerful force than sexual selection in shaping risk-related behaviors. Area-level socioeconomic status was strongly associated with the frequency of risk-taking, implying that environmental stressors can affect risk attitude. Elucidating the ultimate drivers behind everyday risk-taking has important practical implications for risk intervention strategies.
... On the contrary, students who declare to often cross even if the light is red or outside the markings, are more likely to be violators also in the VR conditions. As observed by Dommes et al., (2015)gender has no influence on the propensity to violate; this result could be contradictory with most of the literature, usually revealing that men are more inclined to violate (Guo et al., 2011;Poó et al., 2018;Rosenbloom, 2009); this difference could be due to the fact that the present analysis referred to a group of relatively young subjects. Furthermore, since students are very similar in age, a significant effect of age on the propensity to violate was not found; supporting this observation, Wang et al. indicated that younger people are generally more likely to violate than adults (Wang et al., 2020). ...
In the literature, numerous studies examined pedestrian behavior within road environments, aiming to contribute to injury prevention. Nevertheless, significant gaps remain, particularly concerning the behavior of young individuals. The present Virtual Reality experiment aimed at two main objectives: (1) understanding the factors associated with the likelihood of young people violating traffic laws and (2) identifying factors influencing their crossing speed, who faced various pedestrian crossing scenarios designed to induce violations are administered to 63 participants aged 11-17. Three main factors are considered in the analysis: socio-economic characteristics, travel patterns, and behavioral tendencies while walking. The results reveal that students who commute on foot and those residing in larger cities are less inclined to violate traffic laws. Furthermore, individuals who report frequent real-life misconduct are more likely to disregard red lights when crossing a signalized crosswalk in the virtual environment. Differences in average crossing speeds are observed between middle school and high school students, as well as between one-lane and two-lane crossing speeds.
... Pedestrians tend to walk faster when they walk alongside others, if the pedestrian happens to be an adult male, when it is raining and colder or those who place higher emphasis on saving time [26], [27], [28], [29]. In terms of crossing behaviour, pedestrians tend to take risks and violate traffic rules when others do so, or when the pedestrians are younger [30], [31], [32]. ...
This agent-based simulation study investigates pedestrian dynamics with a focus on the impacts of behaviour idling on pedestrian flows. It also examines the influence of psychological, social, and environmental factors on pedestrian flows. Our research categorises pedestrian behaviour into three types: time-sensitive (Type A), mobility-constrained (Type B), and 'wandering' type (Type C), defined as pedestrians moving without a specific destination, which includes tourists, shoppers, and leisure walkers. We demonstrate how behaviour heterogeneity influences flow and movement patterns through simulations in unidirectional, bi-directional, and multi-directional pedestrian facilities. We find that Type C pedestrians significantly slow down Type A pedestrians, leading to a speed reduction of up to 30% in high-density tourist scenarios, and cause prolonged stationary periods for Type B pedestrians, particularly in less crowded settings where Type C's tendency to idle is more pronounced. Our results show a linear relationship between density and speed reduction, with tourist behaviour notably exacerbating congestion in high-density environments. Key insights highlight the critical role of wandering (Type C) behaviours in affecting pedestrian flow, emphasising the necessity for urban planning and infrastructure design to accommodate this variability. Future research aims to apply these findings to real-world contexts, further refining urban design strategies to accommodate the full spectrum of pedestrian behaviours.
... Studies consistently have shown that men break these rules more frequently than women. For example, Rosenbloom's (2009) study of Israeli pedestrians found that men were significantly more likely to make an illegal street crossing during red lights (20.6 vs. 8.5%), as did Tom and Granié's (2011) study of French pedestrians (18 vs. 4.1%). These gender-based differences in rule breaking have serious consequences: men pedestrians account for over 70% of injuries due to crashes (Leaf and Preusser, 1999), and they are one and a half times more likely to be killed (Joly et al., 1992). ...
Although safety within operational systems depends on compliance with regulations, non-compliance is common in many settings. Trucking is a meaningful industry for studying operational safety compliance given that the industry is large and important, truck accidents kill thousands annually, and such accidents collectively cost the U.S. economy billions of dollars. Although the truck driving occupation is dominated by men, significant efforts are underway to recruit more women into the profession. If women are safer behind the wheel than men, increasing their ranks could improve overall safety compliance. Building on theory and evidence suggesting that men have a greater willingness to take risky actions and break rules, we used data on 22 million truck inspections from 2010 to 2022 to identify an operational safety compliance gap between men and women truckers. Overall, men were 7.4% more likely to be cited for a major violation of rules governing working hours (known as hours-of-service or HOS rules) and 13.2% more likely to have a major unsafe driving violation. We then examined whether gap changes based on carrier size and type. We found that the HOS compliance gap is smaller for small carriers (vs. large) and private carriers (vs. for-hire), but not the unsafe driving gap. Finally, we tested whether the introduction of an intervention—electronic logging devices (ELDs) that automatically record truckers’ driving hours—closes the gap by increasing men's compliance. In line with predictions, differences between men and women disappeared after the mandate; but again, only for HOS compliance. Surprisingly, women had significantly more HOS violations in 2021 and 2022 than men—an outcome that may be tied to women truckers’ personal safety issues. In summary, the results and additional robustness checks indicate that men committed more unsafe driving violations (e.g., speeding) than women across the entire study period, while the pattern of HOS violations varied based on external events. We conclude by highlighting possible pathways for reducing the number of collisions involving trucks and thus lowering the number of fatalities and extent of economic losses.
... It often changes according to the surroundings. Nevertheless, pedestrians naturally adapt to their surroundings (Rosenbloom, 2009). The behavior of pedestrians at some location is not entirely similar with other location. ...
Traffic accidents involving pedestrians are the major causes of fatality and injury at urban signalized intersections in India. This study investigates the effect of various factors on pedestrian compliance at urban signalized intersection. The data is collected using video recording and questionnaire survey in New Delhi, India. Chi-square and t-test are performed to identify statistically significant variables. Single factor model is developed using odds ratio (OR) statistics. Pedestrian compliance behavior models are developed using binomial logistic regression. The models have good predictive capabilities and their success rate of prediction is more than 80%. The data shows that the crosswalk compliance is only 16.4%. The major reason for non compliance is to save time and personal convenience. The findings from this study would help city planners, traffic engineers and policy makers to improve pedestrian safety at signalized intersection.
... Many previous studies have been conducted to identify the factors influencing the jaywalking behavior of pedestrians. Factors such as age, gender, marital status, gap size, and waiting time were included in various studies (Rosenbloom, 2009;Kadali et al., 2014;Jain et al., 2014). Additionally impact of type of vehicles, vehicle speed, walking speed, condition of built environment such as traffic congestion, traffic volume, presence of crosswalk was analyzed in various previous studies (Shaaban et al., 2018;Bansal et al., 2019;Brosseau et al., 2013;Shaaban, 2019;Sze and Wong, 2007). ...
In Bangladesh, majority of pedestrian road crossing fatalities involve young pedestrians. Among them, university students were found to be at higher risk of road traffic accidents, with most of these accidents occurring during commutes to and from the university. However, while exploring the causation of crashes involving these young university students, their jaywalking behavior was not thoroughly examined and was often ignored. In our study 430 samples of data were collected through a questionnaire survey and logistic regression analysis was conducted to explore the influence of socioeconomic, demographic, risk perception, traffic law awareness, and other situational factors on jaywalking among university students in Bangladesh. Based on various parameters, the logistic regression model assists in predicting the students' decision-making process before crossing a road. The findings suggest that the most influential factors concerning jaywalking behavior are gender, study year, current living area, eye problem, mode of transportation, mental trauma, use of smartphone, attention to traffic signs, level of safety knowledge, seasonal variation, presence of friends. The outcome of this study will inform policymakers about the characteristics of the students who are more prone to jaywalking and the necessary road safety education training that can be initiated for them.
... Indeed, a main norm for pedestrians is to cross only when the traffic light is green. Empirical studies, however, reveal that many also cross when the light is redparticularly when there are fewer people waiting for the light to become green (Rosenbloom, 2009). This suggests that another norm is involved, namely that one's behavior should be aligned with what others do (Cialdini, 2006). ...
Service robots are expected to become increasingly common. As their capabilities become more advanced, it is also expected that they would be involved in tasks for which a human user would want to know why they do what they are doing. One way to accomplish this is to program robots so that they verbalize (i.e., they are thinking aloud) while they are providing service. This ability is likely to be particularly useful for tasks that involve behavioral norms. The present study used an experimental design to manipulate the level of a robot's ability to verbalize motivations for its behavior (low vs. high) while it was asked by a human to carry out a task with moral implications. The results show that robot verbalizing contributed positively to satisfaction with the robot's performance, and that this impact was mediated by understandability, perceived morality and intellectual stimulation.
... Instead, they reveal behaviors. Factors impacting pedestrian behavior has been explored in [127,128,125,136,149,40,129]. In [129], researchers enumerated two sets of factors: Pedestrian factors and Environmental Factors, [ Figure 2.5]. ...
Scenario-based testing for autonomous vehicles in a virtual environment is crucial partly due to the safety concern and partly due to experimental features. We can build and test new algorithms in a virtual environment without exposing real-world beings to life-endangering threats. Some approaches create scenarios from real-world data, and some create scenarios based on search-based simulation. For search-based simulation, we use procedural content generation strategies to build roads and artifacts of the virtual world. In this work, we focus on a specific set of real-world scenarios regarding jaywalking and lay out our plan to create such scenarios using adversarial strategies, ensuring the variety and representativeness of such scenarios. We also offer a set of metrics to measure the validity and plausibility of the scenarios. In simple terms, we create a simulation engine that will take an AV model as input, run simulations on it with different adversarial jaywalkers in the adversarially generated world, and produce a set of plausible scenarios where the AV model may fail.
... Hussein et al., (2015) observed 1988 pedestrians for two hours at two signalized crosswalks at a busy New York city intersection and recorded one-third of the pedestrians being involved in a pedestrian-vehicle conflict, or 72 pedestrian-vehicle conflicts were recorded every hour. Rosenbloom (2009) also observed 1392 pedestrians (94% in the 20-40 years age range) at a signalized crossing and reported that more pedestrians were likely to violate crossing rules when they were crossing as an individual than when they were in a group setting; this contrasts with the findings from the current study. ...
The use of personal listening devices (PLDs) is most prevalent among the college attending population. PLDs can be quite distracting, especially when its users are performing focused tasks such as street crossings. Such scenarios are commonplace on campuses of rural higher education institutes, where students must cross multiple unsignalized crosswalks to get to their destination. To evaluate the dangers of PLD use and pedestrian behavior while navigating crosswalks, 1274 pedestrians were systematically observed over nine hours at four crosswalks; naturalistic observations were followed by a survey of 135 pedestrians, and two focus groups with a total of eight participants following a unique three-stage protocol. Results show that societal distractions such as crossing in group settings or talking with other members of a group while crossing led to more risky pedestrian behavior, than did technological distractors such as PLDs or cellphone use. There was also a consensus on hand gesture meanings for pedestrian-driver communication despite the presence of relatively diverse population. Findings from this study can serve as guidelines to develop external human machine interfaces (eHMIs) for automated vehicles, and appropriate countermeasures to reduce pedestrian distractions at crosswalks of higher education institutes.
... The accidents that involving pedestrian also contributed by pedestrian's violation (Taubman-Ben-Ari & Shay, 2012;Castanier et al. 2013;Qu et al. 2016;Deb et al. 2017). Some of them not abide the road regulations by crossing the road illegally (Rosenbloom, 2009;Hijar et al, 2003). Illegal crossing includes crossing the road during red light for pedestrian, do not use pedestrian crossing, crossing the road abruptly and do mid-block and diagonal crossing in order to save time (Baltes, Chu & Guttenplan, 2003). ...
Road accidents among pedestrian become an important issue that needs to be mitigated due to high injuries and fatalities cases. Pedestrian is a weakest group of people compared to the drivers because they are not fully protected. The accidents involving pedestrian may occur due to their own negative crossing behaviour. This study is purposely to identify the effectiveness of theory of planned behaviour (TPB) in predicting pedestrian behaviour. TPB has three main constructs which are attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control that significant to behavioural intention. Some studies used extended TPB by adding other constructs such as moral norms, perceived risk, conformity tendency, perceived severity, and past behaviour to predict pedestrian behaviour more accurately. This study used a literature approach where some of the previous studies are examined and the results of the studies are being analysed using descriptive analysis. The results show that TPB is suitable to predict pedestrian behaviour because the constructs are significant and comply with its fit. This study also shows that pedestrian behaviours are differ according to their age and gender. Most of previous studied states that young people tends to perform risky behaviours compared to old people. Children pedestrian are more vulnerable and have a high tendency to involve in road accidents and have a high fatality risk. Men are more risk-taking compared to women and men have high tendency to violate road regulations and exposed to injuries and fatality while women have more positive crossing behaviour.
... Beyond personal dimensions, external factors associated with the environment where pedestrians walk, can also influence walking behavior. These include the geographic locations, cultural and traffic regulations, infrastructure characteristics, the presence of obstacles, and traffic conditions (23,27,29). As regards social factors, there is substantial evidence that variables such as group size and sex composition influence the walking speed of groups of pedestrians. ...
A significant percentage of pedestrians walk in social groups (friends, families, or acquaintances who walk together). Although patterns generated by social interactions among group members have been shown to affect crowd dynamics, studies on the effect of social interactions at different crossing phases under low pedestrian density are limited. This study aims to comprehensively examine the influence of size and sex composition on pedestrians’ behaviors when walking alone and with friends in different phases before, during, and after the road crossing. For this, experiences were carried out with controlled small groups of friends (varying size and sex composition) at three unsignalized crosswalks with low pedestrian density. The average speed and distance between the young pedestrians in six segments of the trajectories (two in each phase), extracted from video recordings, were analyzed with linear mixed models. Results show that pedestrians reduce their speed when approaching the curb, they accelerate while on the crosswalk, and reduce again when they reach the other side. In all phases, the average speed of the groups was lower than the single pedestrians, and the females’ groups walked slower than the males, except during the crossing, where no sex-related differences were found. On the contrary, before the crossing, the distance increased and decreased from the second segment in the crosswalk. The smallest distance was observed between the female groups and dyads. These findings have relevant implications for research on pedestrian behavior, helping to better understand the complexity of pedestrian dynamics and improve pedestrian safety.
This study examines the effect of demographic parameters on drivers’ risk-taking, concentrating on distracted driving, traffic rule violations, attentiveness towards children and road safety, and risk perception. A driver behavior questionnaire survey was conducted among different vehicle drivers from seven district headquarter town of Odisha, India, in an environment where traffic violations are common in mixed traffic condition. The study indicated that males are more distracted than female drivers and subjected to serious injuries. Drivers aged 18–30 and 31–50 years were more distracted than those were over 51 years. The average distracted driving rate among undergraduate drivers was 15.27% higher than for post-graduate drivers and 23.88% higher than for drivers with education above post-graduate. Graduate drivers care more about children and road safety. Two-wheeler and three-wheeler drivers are more distracted than four-wheeler drivers. Male two- and three-wheeler drivers with lower education levels need to be counsel drivers based on these findings to make the road safer for their journey. Educating and campaigning about distracted driving, attention towards children and road safety will make the road further safer. Eventually, contribute valuable insights into improving road safety to reduce the number of road injuries, and prevent children using the road from experiencing distress.
As urban environments become increasingly congested, understanding pedestrian behaviors at intersections is essential for ensuring safety and efficiency. This study explores the complexities of pedestrian behavior in urban traffic networks, focusing on sensitivity analysis using a microscopic simulation tool and a pedestrian module based on the social force model (SFM). By examining nine key pedestrian behavior parameters in isolation, this research identifies their impact on gap acceptance behavior. This exploratory approach highlights how individual parameters, such as Lambda—indicative of a pedestrian’s responsiveness to stimuli from behind—affect the variability in and distribution of gap acceptance times. The findings provide valuable insights into the interplay between pedestrian behavior parameters and their influence on decision-making processes. These results serve as a foundation for refining pedestrian behavior models, offering practical guidance for urban planners, traffic engineers, and policymakers. By emphasizing sensitivity analysis, this study demonstrates the utility of microscopic simulation models in achieving a more profound, nuanced understanding of pedestrian dynamics, contributing to the development of safer and more efficient urban environments.
We introduce the idea of deterring undesirable behaviors by raising incivility awareness—sensitivity to when one is violating norms of civil behavior. We demonstrate that this approach is effective in deterring pedestrians from crossing intersections at red lights, which is a serious worldwide safety problem. In three field experiments conducted at urban intersections (involving more than 12,000 total observations), we found that posting signs raising pedestrians’ incivility awareness significantly reduced red-light crossing rates. We also found that the incivility-awareness message of “Crossing at the red light is uncivil” made those signs more effective than signs with messages that emphasized the importance of not crossing at a red light (“Don't cross at the red light”), civil behavior (“Waiting for the green light is civil”), safety (“Waiting for the green light is good for safety”), and danger (“Crossing at the red light is bad for safety”).
Pedestrian attitude is an important issue in road safety. In order to understand pedestrian attitudes, it is necessary to study their sociodemographic and psychological characteristics. With respect to this, the aim of the study was to examine age and sex differences in impulsive behavior and the role of impulsive behavior on pedestrian attitudes in Türkiye. A total of 347 Turkish pedestrians (145 male, 202 female) completed the Pedestrian Attitude Questionnaire (PAQ), the Urgency Premeditation Perseverance Sensation Seeking (UPPS) Impulsive Behavior Scale, and a Questionnaire Form. First, the psychometric structure of the PAQ was found to support the original structure, addressing attitudes towards other road users and attitudes towards traffic rules. With increasing age, negative attitudes towards traffic rules decreased. Female pedestrians also showed more negative attitudes towards other road users. The results of hierarchical regression analyses indicate that impulsive behavior is significantly associated with pedestrian attitudes depending on sociodemographic factors. The findings suggest that pedestrians’ impulsive behavior may influence their attitudes in traffic, but this influence varies by age and sex. The outcomes have important implications for intervention studies and road safety.
Increased pedestrian–vehicle interactions, especially at signalized intersection crosswalks, have resulted in more pedestrian fatalities, and this situation worsens under heterogeneous traffic conditions. Therefore, evaluating pedestrian road-crossing safety is crucial, especially at signalized intersection crosswalks. This article aims to study pedestrian crossing safety at signalized intersection crosswalks based on the safety margin. Video graphic data were collected from eight signalized intersections. Data were extracted, and significant variables influencing the pedestrian safety margin (PSM) were identified. A random-intercept multiple linear regression model for predicting the PSM was estimated. Data included site, demographic, behavioral, exposure, the state of the crossing (distraction), glance, and traffic characteristics as variables. The model results revealed that pedestrians used the largest safety margin against heavy vehicles while crossing in a group. Pedestrians’ crossing speed has a significant influence on the PSM. It was also found that pedestrians showed the highest level of caution (used the largest safety margin) against right-turning vehicles compared with through vehicles. The glance variable estimates revealed that the “during-crossing glance” is an important determinant of the PSM, while the “before-crossing glance” is insignificant. In addition, unsafe pedestrian crossing behavior concerning distractors highlighted that the use of headphones significantly influences the PSM. The results of the current PSM model could aid in the efficient design of future pedestrian infrastructure and suggest appropriate remedial measures for existing intersection crosswalks to enhance pedestrian safety.
Background. Considering the high number of pedestrian accidents in Marand and their subsequent physical, psychological, social, and economic damages on the individual, family, and society, the current study was conducted to investigate the relationship between the socioeconomic status and traffic behavior of pedestrians. Methods. This descriptive-analytical study was conducted in Marand, one of the major cities in East Azerbaijan province of Iran in 2018-2019. The statistical population of the research included all the pedestrians of Marand. The statistical sample consisted of 515 pedestrians who were chosen from individuals who walked to the health centers. Data was collected using the pedestrian behavior questionnaire and the socioeconomic status questionnaire. Data analysis was conducted using SPSS software (version 23), which included descriptive statistics, independent t-test, and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). Results. The mean (standard deviation) of the total score of pedestrian traffic behavior in this study was 82.07 (7.80). The results of the independent t-test showed that the average score of aggressive behavior had a significant relationship with gender. As such, men had better traffic behaviors than women pedestrians. Based on the results of one-way ANOVA, the mean score of positive behaviors was significantly different in various age groups. Married pedestrians had fewer distracted behaviors than single pedestrians. Also, in all dimensions of traffic behavior, with the improvement of the socioeconomic status, the average score of traffic behavior increased. However, this increase was significant only in the subscales of adherence to traffic rules, positive behaviors, and distraction. Conclusion. According to the results of this study, pedestrians who had a lower socioeconomic status showed more unsafe behaviors while crossing the road. Also, unsafe behaviors were more common among female pedestrians and young age groups. Therefore, measures such as implementing educational and environmental interventions considering pedestrians’ demographic characteristics should be adopted to improve their traffic knowledge and behavior.
Pedestrian risky behaviors are one of the contributing factors to crashes involving pedestrians. Therefore, it is crucial to comprehend the mechanisms by which pedestrians interact with many influential components in the traffic environment. This study aimed to evaluate pedestrians’ red light running intentions and related factors under different traffic flow scenarios, including straight traffic flow, right-turning traffic flow, and left-turning traffic flow. A theoretical approach based on the theory of planned behavior (TPB) and the prototype willingness model (PWM) was employed. Data were collected from an online survey of 2250 participants in Tehran, Iran. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to identify the significant factors that explain intentions. All models successfully explained the behavioral intention for red light running violation; however, the findings revealed that the integrated model was the best-performing model to represent violation and, thus, was selected for interpreting the results and drawing relevant conclusions. Different traffic flow scenarios had varied effects on violation intentions for individual characteristics and model constructs. Previous crash experiences and driving-related background variables emerged to impact pedestrian violation intention across three scenarios. The findings also suggested that the rational constructs (attitude, perceived behavioral control, and facilitating conditions) had a more robust impact on violation intention compared to reactive constructs (prototype similarity, prototype favorability), with facilitating conditions being the strongest predictor of the model, followed by attitudes toward violation as a significant predictor of intention for red light violation. According to the results, the mechanism of risk-taking varies depending on the direction of the traffic flow. Higher risk was associated with the violation at the intersections with straight traffic flow compared to the intersections with turning traffic flow. Based on the findings of this study, several implications, including interventions focusing on individuals’ transportation safety attitudes, countermeasures to increase the risk perception of pedestrians toward turning vehicles, and countermeasures regarding the use of mobile phones while walking for the context of this study were proposed.
Background
Pedestrian crashes, often occurring while road crossing and associated with crossing behaviour, make up 34.8% of road casualties in Uganda. This study determined crossing behaviour and associated factors among child pedestrians around primary schools in Kampala, Uganda.
Methods
We conducted a cross-sectional study in 2022 among 2100 primary school children. Data on their crossing behaviour were collected using video recordings from cameras staged at the crossing points of 21 schools. We estimated prevalence ratios (PR) with their corresponding 95% CIs using a modified Poisson regression model for the association between unsafe behaviour and the predictors.
Results
The prevalence for each of 5 unsafe child pedestrian behaviour was 206 (25.8%) for crossing outside the crosswalk, 415 (19.8%) for failing to wait at the kerb, 238 (11.3%) for failing to look for vehicles, 361 (17.2%) for running and 235 (13%) for crossing between vehicles. There was a higher likelihood of crossing outside the crosswalk when an obstacle was present (adjusted PR (aPR) 1.8; 95% CI 1.40 to 2.27) and when children crossed alone (aPR 1.5; 95% CI 1.13 to 2.06). Children who crossed without a traffic warden (aPR 2; 95% CI 1.40 to 2.37) had a significantly higher prevalence of failing to wait at a kerb.
Conclusion
These findings reveal the interaction between child pedestrians, vehicles and the environment at crossings. Some factors associated with unsafe child pedestrian behaviour were the presence of an obstacle, crossing alone and the absence of a traffic warden. These findings can help researchers and practitioners understand child pedestrian crossing behaviour, highlighting the need to prioritise targeted safety measures.
Human behavior is influenced by the presence of others, which scientists also call ‘the audience effect’. The use of social control to produce more cooperative behaviors may positively influence road use and safety. This study uses an online questionnaire to test how eyes images affect the behavior of pedestrians when crossing a road. Different eyes images of men, women and a child with different facial expressions -neutral, friendly and angry- were presented to participants who were asked what they would feel by looking at these images before crossing a signalized road. Participants completed a questionnaire of 20 questions about pedestrian behaviors (PBQ). The questionnaire was received by 1,447 French participants, 610 of whom answered the entire questionnaire. Seventy-one percent of participants were women, and the mean age was 35 ± 14 years. Eye images give individuals the feeling they are being observed at 33%, feared at 5% and surprised at 26%, and thus seem to indicate mixed results about avoiding crossing at the red light. The expressions shown in the eyes are also an important factor: feelings of being observed increased by about 10-15% whilst feelings of being scared or inhibited increased by about 5% as the expression changed from neutral to friendly to angry. No link was found between the results of our questionnaire and those of the Pedestrian Behavior Questionnaire (PBQ). This study shows that the use of eye images could reduce illegal crossings by pedestrians, and is thus of key interest as a practical road safety tool. However, the effect is limited and how to increase this nudge effect needs further consideration.
This special issue focuses on collective responses to organizational change with a goal of enhancing knowledge on the emergence of these higher‐level responses to change. While researchers acknowledge that organizational change inherently involves processes at multiple levels (individual, team, organization), scholars have only recently begun to increasingly promote models of collective responses to change. Spotlighting this gap, in this paper, we explore the dynamic character of collective responses to change, note the multiple ways in which these may develop, and identify theoretical frames rooted in psychology and sociology. This approach contributes to the growing field of responses beyond the individual. Through the papers in the special issue, we offer a framework based on Bourdieu's theory of practice as a platform for bringing together perspectives on agency and structuralism on how responses to change are shaped in the collective. With this framing, we provide direction for future research on successful organizational change through the interrelations between individuals and collectives undergoing change.
Accurate pedestrian crossing intention prediction is critical for autonomous vehicles and advanced driver assistance systems. In multi-pedestrian and multi-vehicle interaction scenes, the social interaction between pedestrians and other traffic participants is ubiquitous, which affects pedestrian crossing decisions and the accuracy of prediction. However, previous studies on pedestrian crossing intention lack comprehensive consideration and mathematical modeling of the social interaction. We propose a “social interaction force” (SIF) to identify and quantify social interaction behaviors and combine the hidden Markov model (HMM) to predict pedestrian crossing intentions 1.0 s ahead. Firstly, a large dataset of pedestrian-vehicle interaction samples is collected from two views, and high-dimensional features are extracted for pedestrian intention prediction. Next, the concept of SIF is proposed to quantitatively characterize the influence of other pedestrians and vehicles on pedestrian crossing decisions, including “pedestrian interaction force” and “pedestrian-vehicle interaction force.” Finally, SIF, pedestrian features, and road structure features are input into HMM. Sliding time windows are applied to the HMM to achieve dynamic prediction of pedestrian intention sequences. Experimental results show that the recognition accuracy of the proposed model is 0.976, and the accuracy of 1.0 s ahead prediction is 0.932 with guaranteed prediction speed. The proposed model performance is superior to that of the most prevalent models developed thus far.
The primary aims of the present studies were to (a) add to the sparse developmental database on risk taking and (b) conduct initial tests of a self-regulation model (SRM) of risk taking. According to the SRM, inappropriate risk taking is associated with overconfidence, falling prey to dysregulating influences (e.g., impulsivity, peer presence, etc.), and an insensitivity to outcomes. Experiment 1 tested these proposals by assessing the effects of peer presence and 4 personal factors on the risk taking of 3rd, 5th, and 7th graders. Results generally supported the predictions of the SRM. In Experiment 2, the SRM gained further support from the finding that 5 variables correlated with risk taking in 4th, 6th, and 8th graders: ability beliefs, a preference for thrill seeking, peer nomination, competitiveness, and interest. The discussion focuses on the meaning of age and gender differences in risk-taking as well as the interventional implications of the SRM.
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Independent field experiments in 23 large cities around the world measured three types of spontaneous, nonemergency helping: alerting a pedestrian who dropped a pen, offering help to a pedestrian with a hurt leg trying to reach a pile of dropped magazines, and assisting a blind person cross the street. The results indicated that a city’s helping rate was relatively stable across the three measures, suggesting that helping of strangers is a cross-culturally meaningful characteristic of a place; large cross-cultural variation in helping emerged, ranging from an overall rate of 93% in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to 40% in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia. Overall helping across cultures was inversely related to a country’s economic productivity; countries with the cultural tradition of simpatia were on average more helpful than countries with no such tradition. These findings constitute a rich body of descriptive data and novel hypotheses about the sociocultural, economic, and psychological determinants of helping behavior across cultures.
Triandis' theoretical framework, concerning cultural patterns labeled individualism and collectivism, is probed with regard to the religious marker in the Israeli Jewish society. Three methods are used to examine collectivism-individualism constructs in 185 religious and 956 secular high school students: value items, interest in different domains of history, and attitudes toward political issues. A common collective basis of mutual value consensus was found in the two groups; however, as predicted, there were differences between secular and religious students on the three kinds of items, since the religious scored higher than the secular students on items emphasizing collectivist orientation. The differences, however, do not fit the common theoretical framework of collectivism-individualism, but rather tend to reflect the distinction between in-group and universal collectivism.
It was hypothesized that people will strategically regulate information about the identities of friends to help them create desired impressions on audiences. Experiment 1 demonstrated that participants described a friend consistently with the qualities preferred by an attractive, opposite-sex individual but inconsistently with the qualities preferred by an unattractive, opposite-sex individual. Experiment 2 showed that a friend who had a high social need to make a good impression on an interviewer was described more positively than a friend who did not have such a need or a stranger regardless of social need. Impression management to benefit friends by promoting and protecting their desired identities may be one of the more common and pleasant forms of help giving in everyday life. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The present study focuses on the effect of the elements of religiosity and faith on pedestrian behavior. The sample consisted of 1047 pedestrians who were observed at two busy urban intersections. The observations were conducted in three separate intervals at two busy intersections in Ramat-Gan (secular area) and Bnei-Brak (ultra-orthodox area) during the afternoon hours. Five activities were the focus of the observation: running a red-light, crossing where there is no crosswalk, walking along the road, failing to check for traffic prior to crossing, and taking a child’s hand when crossing. A Chi square test for independence was used to estimate the effect of location, gender and age. In the case of two-by-two cross-tabulation, Φ, the non-directional measure of association for categorical variables, was calculated. Findings indicate that males committed significantly more violations than females, and there is a negative correlation between age and frequency of violations. The younger the individual, the more frequently s/he commits a violation. Beyond age and gender as behavioral determinants, pedestrians in the orthodox environment committed violations about three times more frequently than those in the secular environment. Part of the robust difference found between the secular and the ultra-orthodox pedestrians, may be due to the fact that the age-related trend does not exist in Bnei-Brak. Age was related to the violation rate in Ramat-Gan, but not in Bnei-Brak. The following discussion relates to ideological, psychological and practical explanations of these findings.
The study examined pedestrians’ self-reported road-crossing behavior in relation to beliefs regarding the consequences of the behavior incorporated in the health belief model, instrumental and normative motives for compliance with safety rules, and situational factors. A questionnaire was administered to 205 students at two Israeli higher education institutions. The results show that crossing against a `Don’t walk' sign is predicted by perceived consequences of the behavior, as well as by normative motives. The results revealed consistent gender differences: women’s perception of their susceptibility to an accident resulting from an unsafe crossing is higher than that of men; women also report more than men that they are motivated by normative and instrumental considerations. Nevertheless, for women unsafe crossing is predicted only by instrumental motives, whereas for men both normative and instrumental motives predict unsafe crossing behavior. Among the situational variables, the presence of other pedestrians is related to the self-reported crossing behavior of women, whereas traffic volume is related to that of men. The results are discussed with regard to similarities and differences between pedestrians and drivers in compliance with safety laws.
This is the author's draft of an article published in Journal of Educational Computing Research. http://www.baywood.com/journals/previewjournals.asp?id=0735-6331 Subjects (36 male, 36 female), aged from 15 to 52 years, performed a computer-based tracking task under one of six audience conditions in an experiment designed to investigate the effects of gender and social facilitation on performance. In addition to the computer task, each subject completed a 15-item questionnaire designed to identify levels of computer usage, computer-related anxiety, confidence and competence when using computers, and attitudes toward computers and computer users. Males performed significantly better than females, and a significant social facilitation effect was found. A significant Gender Audience interaction was found, with females performing very much better in the presence of a female audience than alone or with a male audience. The implication for educational policy and practice are briefly discussed.
The primary aims of the present studies were to (a) add to the sparse developmental database on risk taking and (b) conduct initial tests of a self-regulation model (SRM) of risk taking. According to the SRM, inappropriate risk taking is associated with overconfidence, falling prey to dysregulating influences (e.g., impulsivity, peer presence, etc.), and an insensitivity to outcomes. Experiment 1 tested these proposals by assessing the effects of peer presence and 4 personal factors on the risk taking of 3rd, 5th, and 7th graders. Results generally supported the predictions of the SRM. In Experiment 2, the SRM gained further support from the finding that 5 variables correlated with risk taking in 4th, 6th, and 8th graders: ability beliefs, a preference for thrill seeking, peer nomination, competitiveness, and interest. The discussion focuses on the meaning of age and gender differences in risk-taking as well as the interventional implications of the SRM.
Three gender-balanced groups of 16 school children (5-6 years, 8-9 years, 11-12 years) participated in individual pretests of vision, hearing, and time to walk across a 12-m wide urban street and back. Each child then completed 10 roadside trials requiring judgement of the threshold point at which they would no longer cross in front of traffic approaching from their right. The judgements were made from a site immediately in front of a parked car at a point 2 m from the kerb and 4 m from the centre of the road. Traffic speeds and distances were measured using a laser speed and distance detector. The results indicated that, overall, distance gap thresholds remained constant regardless of vehicle approach speeds. Analysis of the thresholds for distance gap judgements for the 4-m half-street crossing showed that some of the older children could be expected to make safe decisions, but this was not so for the 5-6- and 8-9-year-olds at vehicle approach speeds above 60 kph. Almost two-thirds of the children reported using distance to judge gaps, which proved the least adequate strategy in terms of proportion of resultant safe decisions. The findings are discussed in relation to developing effective child pedestrian safety strategies.
In an observational study of the perception of risks and cautionary behaviors displayed by 571 pedestrians waiting to cross signal-controlled intersections in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, cautiousness was measured by distance stood from the curb and whether a pedestrian checked for traffic before crossing. Female and older pedestrians were more perceptive of risks and were more cautious. Greater caution was demonstrated when outside temperatures were warm rather than cold, when traffic volumes were low, when crosswalks were icy rather than dry, and when pedestrian volumes were low. The impact of pedestrian volumes was interpreted in terms of a diffusion of responsibility and the concept of safety in numbers. Width of crosswalk and time of day did not significantly affect cautiousness.
An expectancy-based explanation of social performance that focuses on the valence of evaluation that is anticipated from an audience was presented and tested. As was predicted, an interaction between a subject's performance ex- pectations and whether he or she performed alone or in the presence of an evaluative audience was found. Subjects expecting to perform successfully an- ticipated a positive evaluation from an audience, resulting in improved perfor- mance over subjects working alone. Conversely, when subjects expected to perform poorly a negative evaluation was anticipated from an audience, although in the overall analysis social performance decrements did not reach significance. However, a comparison with a performance baseline condition. and a reanalysis of data from subjects who did not receive preliminary performance feedback, indicated that both social facilitation and impairment effects were evident. Results are discussed in terms of an expectancy-based explanation of social performance.
Self control theory assumes stable individual differences in the tendency to commit criminal acts. Social control theory assumes that this tendency is a function of bonds to conventional institutions that may vary in strength and intensity over the life course. The two theories may be accommodated by assuming that strength-of-bond differences between individuals are in fact stable and are a major component of self-control. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Identifying the causes of accidents is a necessary prerequisite for preventive action. Some research suggests however that the analysis of accidents does not only differ between experts and laymen but that it is also linked to certain characteristics inherent in the analyst and in the social group to which he belongs: beliefs, value systems, norms, experiences in common, attitudes, roles, social and technical practices, etc. Culturally determined bias seems to affect the perception of risk and the causes of accidents. This article presents a certain number of thoughts and results based upon research carried out on causal attributions of traffic accidents in The Ivory Coast (West Africa) and discusses the importance of culture in risk-taking and accident prevention. It shows in particular that fatalistic beliefs and mystical practices influence the perception of accidents and consequently incite one to take more risks and neglect safety measures.
Unintentional injuries are the number one cause of death among children beyond one year of age. Many injuries among school-age children happen when they are away from home and in the company of peers. The aim in this study was to examine peer influences on children's judgments about engaging in behaviors that threaten their physical safety. Children were shown pictures depicting play situations which involved different paths of travel, each of which posed different degrees of injury risk. Children were asked to select the path they would take, and to assign a danger rating to reflect their beliefs about the likelihood of injury along this path. A peer-influence session followed, in which a same-sex friend attempted to persuade the child to take another path. Following exposure to the friend's arguments, children made their final decision about a path of travel in each play situation; the peer was not present during this decision and the experimenter present was unaware of the child's initial path choice. A number of other measures were taken in an effort to determine factors that influence children's risk-taking decisions. Results revealed that friends were successful in their persuasion efforts: for two of the three play situations, a significant number of children who initially selected low-risk paths switched to more risky paths. Appraisal of danger related to initial path decisions, but number of hazards identified and injury history did not significantly relate to initial decisions. The implications of these results for our understanding of injury-outcome processes are discussed.
This paper presents a methodology for studying pedestrians’ behavior at pedestrian crossings. To help understand the behavior of pedestrians, separate models were developed and estimated for divided and undivided streets. Estimated models include waiting time at the curbside and the number of crossing attempts needed by the pedestrian to make a successful crossing. From a broad range of road user and roadway factors, the strongest and most significant predictors which influenced the pedestrian’s waiting time and the frequency of attempts to cross the streets were gender, age, number of children in household, crossing frequency, number of people in the group attempting to cross, access to private vehicle, destination, home location in relation to pedestrian crossing, and pedestrian past involvement in traffic accidents. In addition to these predictors, maximum likelihood estimates revealed that the pedestrian expected waiting time seems to profoundly influence the number of attempts needed to successfully cross the street (divided or undivided). Furthermore, results relating to pedestrian crossings on divided streets indicate that the pedestrian’s expected waiting time when crossing from one side of the street to the central refuge island seem to increase the risk to end the waiting time when crossing from the refuge island to the other side of the street. Finally, results seem to suggest that pedestrians behave differently or have different waiting times as they cross from one side of the street to the refuge and from the refuge to the other side of the street.
New Zealand adolescent males (n = 389) and females (n = 247) with a mean age of 15.86 years, were compared on a number of self-reported risky driving and passenger behaviors and attitudes. The survey found that males were significantly more likely than females to report driving, engaging in unsafe driving behaviors, drinking and driving, speeding on the open road, breaking the night curfew associated with being on a restricted licence, and dangerous thought patterns. Females were more likely to have been the passenger of a drinking driver after the last party they attended. High levels of unlicensed driving, breaking the rules associated with a restricted licence, failing to wear a seat belt in the back seat, speeding, and being the passenger of a drinking driver were found in both groups. Recommendations for intervention strategies are made.
This study aimed to examine responses of sensation seekers concerning their tendency to take risks in driving in mortality salience. Ss completed the Zuckerman's Sensation Seeking scale (SSS). Two weeks later Ss were divided into two groups; the experimental group, which was exposed to a terrifying video film dealing with consequences of risky driving and a control group with a nature video film. After watching the films, each participant was asked to complete a risk-taking inventory (RT), which referred to the extent of risk s/he would take while driving. High sensation seekers reported more risk taking in driving than sensation avoiders. Furthermore, a significant interaction was found between Mortality Salience and Sensation Seeking regarding risky driving, especially speeding. The implications of these findings on the well-established educational approaches based on terror are presented in the discussion.
Pedestrian injury collisions often occur when and where large numbers of pedestrians travel within complex roadway systems with high traffic flow. The pedestrian injury literature suggests a number of individual and environmental correlates of injury risks, however studies in this area have primarily focused upon demographic differences (e.g. related to age) and a few global characteristics of the roadway system (e.g. aspects of pedestrian traffic). Studies in which the geography of communities has been considered are primarily descriptive, identifying pedestrian injury 'hot spots'. The current study more extensively explores some geographic correlates of pedestrian injury collisions through a spatial analysis of data from the city of San Francisco, CA. A spatial autocorrelation corrected regression model was used to determine factors associated with pedestrian traffic injury in 1990. The study used a geographic information system to map locations of pedestrian injuries, and environmental and demographic characteristics of the city across census tract units. In addition to a number of demographic factors (gender, age, marital status, education, income and unemployment), it was proposed that several environmental features of the city would be related to injury rates (high traffic flow, complex roadway systems, greater population densities and alcohol availability). Results of the study showed that pedestrian injury rates were related to traffic flow, population density, age composition of the local population, unemployment, gender and education. Availability of alcohol through bars was directly related to pedestrian injury collisions in which the pedestrian had been drinking alcohol.
The relevance of the construct of sensation seeking, particularly the motivation to seek thrill and adventure and to avoid boredom, to detection of danger on the road, in particular choices made in conditions of road dilemmas (e.g. road-crossing and amber-light), was examined. 412 participants, males and females, from three age groups--7, 13 and 22--completed Zuckerman's test of sensation seeking and were exposed to the following experiments: Virtual driving, road crossing and go-carting. In each experiment, participants were exposed individually to a series of road dilemmas, constructed according to the paradigm of signal detection. In each dilemma, a dichotomous choice was made: To do or not to do. Age- and gender-dependent responses and connections were obtained. Most noticeable is a risky shift in males' detection responses and an inverse trend in females.
This paper shows how the paradigm of signal detection could serve as a viable means for the analysis of drivers' choices in conditions of everyday life traffic dilemmas. The participants were 28 drivers, most of them professional, who spend at least 6 h a day on the road. All agreed to have a note-taking silent passenger for the entire journey, every day during a period of 3-4 weeks. All completed the sensation-seeking questionnaire. Their 'to do or not to do' choices in conditions of four (out of a total of six) traffic dilemmas (amber light, distance keeping, stopping in road-crossing and merging in routes) were analyzable in terms of a modification of the paradigm of signal detection. In accord with the basics of the paradigm of signal detection, the rate of success of the drivers to detect signals of danger on the road (perceptual sensitivity) fell into the range of partial uncertainty (more than 50% and not too much above this level)! The choices made by thrill-and-adventure-seeking drivers were more lenient than the choices of the drivers who scored lower on this dimension.
(in Hebrew) <http://www.tel-aviv.gov.il> Retrieved 01.05.07. The National Authority of Road Safety
- Tel Aviv Municipality Report
Tel Aviv Municipality Report. (2006). (in Hebrew) <http://www.tel-aviv.gov.il> Retrieved 01.05.07. The National Authority of Road Safety. (2006). <http://pasimlev.mot.gov.il/RoadSafety> Retrieved 17.05.07. WHO. (2002). <http://www.who.int/topics/injuries_traffic/en/>.
A review of pedestrian safety research in the United States and abroad pedestrian and bicycle information center
Federal Highway Administration. (2004). A review of pedestrian safety research in the United States and abroad pedestrian and bicycle information center.
<http://www.who.int/en/> Retrieved 25.06.07.
(in Hebrew) <http://www.cbs.gov
Israel Central Bureau of Statistics. (2005). (in Hebrew) <http://www.cbs.gov.il/> Retrieved 17.05.07.
Detection of danger signals on the road and social facilitation. Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Social Sciences degree in the
- Ben Moshe
Ben Moshe, D. (2003). Detection of danger signals on the road and social facilitation. Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of
Social Sciences degree in the Department of Criminology, Bar-Ilan University.
Detection of danger signals on the road and social facilitation
- D Ben Moshe
Ben Moshe, D. (2003). Detection of danger signals on the road and social facilitation. Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of
Social Sciences degree in the Department of Criminology, Bar-Ilan University.
Children’s peer cultures
- Carsaro
For heaven’s sake keep the rules: Pedestrians’ behavior at intersections in ultra-orthodox and secular cities
- Rosenbloom