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Mental Health and Transport
TRL is proudly supporting Road Safety Week, the UK’s biggest annual road safety campaign, which is organised by the road safety charity Brake. Brake has been working with communities and organisations across the UK since 1995 to make streets safer and to support people bereaved and seriously injured on roads. TRL is a world leader in transport safety and has developed products and expert services that have been proven to analyse, minimise and prevent road collisions. Today, Road Safety Week is focusing on road users with differing needs and our guest author for this related blog is Rebecca Posner from the UK’s Centre for Connected & Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV):
Published on 17 November 2022
You might wonder why I’m starting a blog about road safety with a statistic on the prevalence of mental health disorders. There are many things that can affect road safety, from risky behaviours to unsafe road environments and vehicles; one aspect that is very rarely talked about is the relationship between hidden disabilities and transport.
Before we explore the relationship (which manifests in at least three ways), it is important to state that, just like physical health, everyone has mental health, and it will vary throughout the course of a person’s life. Therefore, it is essential we don’t underestimate or overlook mental health when considering both road safety and wider transport systems.
First, hidden mental disabilities can have an impact on driving behaviour and road use. They can increase the levels of risky behaviours such as hostile or reckless driving and can increase errors; unpublished TRL research has shown that those with higher levels of stress or negative wellbeing are also more likely to commit traffic violations. This has direct implications for road safety, but research has also shown that providing drivers with the tools to help manage their stress and anxiety during the driving task can help mitigate these outcomes. For instance, TRL research exploring whether cognitive behavioural therapy could help reduce motorcyclist stress and stress-related anxiety showed some promise by increasing motorcyclists’ feelings of control when faced with difficult situations.
Second, transport can impact mental health. Transport systems have been found to increase feelings of anxiety, stress and even distress across the whole population but these impacts are greater for those currently experiencing poor mental health (see also here). This can be due to factors such as vehicle design, poor infrastructure design or maintenance (e.g. lack of footpaths or use of confined spaces), atmosphere (e.g. poor air quality, too much noise, or poor lighting), challenges with route planning (e.g. being in unfamiliar routes or environments), poor information provision (e.g. too much information that becomes overwhelming, or inadequate signage) and the behaviour of others (e.g. unpredictability of other people). These factors can lead to impacts ranging from a slight reduction in comfort through to total avoidance of certain modes of transport.
Which brings us to the third part of the relationship between mental health and transport: the way that mental health can affect our travel mode choice. It is well established that travel mode choice is the product of a range of factors and that these can vary for different groups of society. Research has shown that the factors that influence travel mode choice or the strength of these factors also vary for those currently experiencing poor mental health. Those with poor mental health will actively look to minimise being in environments where they are likely to experience distress, perceived uncertainty, or perceived loss of control. This often leads to these groups actively avoiding some modes of shared transport, instead opting for private car use due to higher perceived rates of control. However, as mentioned mental health can impact our driving behaviour, and can increase stress – thus creating a paradox by which, through trying to avoid modes that are perceived to lead to increased stress, people are adopting ones that will have more negative impacts on their mental health, physical health and road safety.
It is therefore important when considering road safety that we don’t just focus on driving behaviour but instead consider safety at a systems level. We must focus on ensuring that all road users feel safe, including actively looking to minimise the likelihood of people experiencing distress, stress or anxiety when using transport, whatever mode they may be using. This is critical for those with mental health disorders, to help them manage their behaviour when driving, to reduce the stresses they may encounter, and to ensure that they are not excluded from the future of transport – the multi-modal ‘new mobility’ world that we see as critical to building a transport system that is clean, safe, and accessible for everyone.
As part of TRL’s support for Road Safety Week, we will be posting a series of blogs written by our in-house experts, looking across the different themes Brake has identified as encapsulating the overall theme of ‘Safe Roads For All’. TRL’s experts have focused on some specific road users and topics within these themes and have tried to think about how all of this relates to a future in which transport is safe for everyone. The blogs cover active travel (Monday); how we teach children and young people about road safety (Tuesday); speed (Wednesday); road users with differing needs (including a focus on mental health and motorcyclists – Thursday); the future of driving (Friday); and the importance of learning from collisions (Sunday).
Check out TRL’s website and social channels for the latest blog.
Road Safety week runs from 14th to 20th November 2022, to find how out you can support Brake visit Road Safety Week | Brake
About the Author
Rebecca Posner is the Head of Social and Behavioural Research within the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV) an expert unit within the UK’s Department for Transport. She is a behavioural psychologist and a member of the British Psychological Society with experience working across academia, the private and public sector.
She specialises in behaviour change and understanding human behaviour within transport focusing on improving the design of transport systems, promoting modal shift and developing accurate mental models to ensure safe use and interaction with new transport technologies. Her research focuses on using innovative research methods and applying behavioural sciences to understand the needs and concerns of all transport users and embedding principles of human centred design into the development and design of future transport systems (vehicles, infrastructure and services) to ensure they are more inclusive, accessible and sustainable. She also advises industry and academia to ensure the best scientific and research principles are adhered too in government and grant funded research, including acting as an advisory board member to UK and EU funded projects.