Citation

Jang S, Li X, Lee C, Wright S. Transp. Res. F Traffic Psychol. Behav. 2024; 103: 163-176.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2024, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.trf.2024.04.003

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Motor vehicle injuries and deaths among adolescents are a significant public health concern in need of persistent attention. During the COVID-19 pandemic, standard traffic safety procedures and policies, including driver licensing systems, were changed, but little is known about whether the changes affected crash outcomes among teen drivers. The purpose of this study was to establish a baseline of teen driver crash factors, including driver/passenger characteristics, vehicle types, roadway conditions, and crash levels. The study then sought to determine injury severity before and during the COVID-19 pandemic using 2018-2021 Florida traffic crash data. For data analysis, a Mediation Model (MM), a type of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), was used to investigate the pathway impact among teen crash factors. In addition, temporal instability was explored to identify the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic throughout the study period.

RESULTS indicate that impaired/aggressive driving (especially drug-related), non-restraint use, rural indicators, dark conditions, head-on collisions, and risky behaviors from other drivers (i.e., distraction and speeding) were statistically significant factors associated with teen driver severe injuries (p-value < 0.01). Further, the presence of peer passengers showed a positive impact by reducing distraction of teen drivers (p-value < 0.01), subsequently resulting in the decreased likelihood of teen drivers' contributing actions and severe injuries (p-value < 0.01). Regarding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of teen drivers involved in Florida traffic crashes in 2020 was reduced by about 22.6 percent compared to previous years. However, fatalities in teen crashes increased by approximately 17 percent during 2020-2021 compared to before COVID-19 (2018-2019). Further research is needed to identify the impacts of changed licensure policies during the COVID-19 pandemic on teen driver crash outcomes and to develop tailored intervention programs and licensing policies to prevent and reduce teen driver motor vehicle injuries and deaths.

Keywords

Injury severity; Structural equation modeling; Mediation model; Peer presence; Teen driver