Citation

Kouabenan DR, Guyot J-M. J. Psychol. Afr. 2004; 14(2): 119–126.

Affiliation

Université Grenoble II

Copyright

(Copyright © 2004, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Three methods were used to analyze 55 reports of actual pedestrian accidents randomly selected from police records in the Ivory Coast. Each method revealed a particular aspect of pedestrian accident causation according to accident severity. A quantitative analysis showed that fatal pedestrian accidents most often occurred when vehicles were speeding or on roads outside the city. A causality-tree analysis showed that the circumstances in which fatal pedestrian accidents occur are somewhat different from those of accidents involving injury only. However, in many cases, the pedestrian was running to cross the road or was hidden by an obstacle, so the driver was startled and reacted too late. Finally, an analysis of the spontaneous causal explanations given by the involved persons made it clear that pedestrians and drivers explain accidents in a defensive way by stressing factors that tend to incriminate the other party. In the conclusion, we point out the utility of an approach that combines several methods of accident analysis and we consider some ways to improve the use of accident reports for prevention purposes.