This graduation theses evaluates the current state of road safety. The work contains the current legislation in the Czech Republic, i.e., regulations and laws. It presents basic concepts in automotive safety. Another part is the analysis and synthesis and the starting point lies in measures to prevent accidents as well as in risk measures in case of accidents. It is therefore to mitigate the damage and injuries due to accidents. In addition, it monitors driver training in driving schools. The final section deals with the proposal for resolving the current situation, in particular proposed measure is applicable in real practice when training drivers.

The bus industry is plagued by high accident costs and risks of passenger injuries. A bus simulator may offer a method of reducing accident rates by delivering targeted training to bus drivers who are most at risk. The first part of this thesis describes the design of the UK's first bus simulator, the fidelity of which was based on a thorough analysis of bus crashes. The second part describes the first studies in a multi-staged method to evaluate the training effectiveness of the simulator: face validity, effects of bus driver experience and stress on simulated performance and simulator sickness. This approach ensured that the ABS has a reasonable level of fidelity, is capable of eliciting behaviourally valid responses from bus drivers and is the first step is achieving training transfer effectiveness. The final study investigated the occurrence of self-bias in bus drivers. The conclusions drove the design of simulated scenarios to be used for bus driver training. Keywords: Bus, Simulator, Fidelity, Validity, Accidents, Driving, Stress, Training

Master of Science / Department of Civil Engineering / Eric J. Fitzsimmons / Transportation officials continuously seek to prevent and reduce wrong-way crashes on interstate highways in the United States. These crashes typically have a high probability of head-on vehicle crashes, resulting in fatalities or serious injuries due to excessive vehicle speeds, and decreased room to maneuver because of fixed barriers or rough shoulders. This research project studied wrong-way crashes on interstate highways in Kansas in order to determine what, if any, statistically significant variables contribute to wrong-way driving crashes. Although these crashes represented only 0.05 percent of all vehicle crashes in Kansas in 2015, wrong-way crashes were found to have a higher rate of fatalities and injuries. In Kansas, 22.6 percent of all crashes and 56 percent of all wrong-way crashes resulted in fatalities and injuries, even though typical vehicle crashes in Kansas occur at non-intersection locations in daylight or in the presence of streetlights without negative factors of adverse weather conditions or drivers influenced by alcohol or drugs. Using crash data provided by the Kansas Department of Transportation from the years 2005 to 2015, the research team examined 372 wrong-way crashes. A cumulative logit statistical model was developed to identify significant characteristics of variables associated with each wrong-way crash. Results showed that driver not under the influence of alcohol or drugs was a significant characteristic in fatal and injury wrong-way crashes. Additionally, certain days of the week were associated with decreased vehicle crash rates when compared to the reference category.

abstract: In 2013, 1.8 million US drivers were responsible for rear-end collisions with other vehicles (NHTSA 2014), for which driver distraction has been identified as the main factor (Campbell, Smith & Najm, 2003; Knipling, Mironer, Hendricks, Tijerina, Everson, Allen & Wilson 1993; Wang, Knipling & Goodman, 1996). The ubiquity of cell phones and their use behind the wheel has played a major role in distracting these drivers. To mitigate this, some manufacturers are equipping vehicles with forward collision warning (FCW) systems. Generally, warnings that are perceived as being urgent produce lower response times. One technique for increasing perceived urgency of a warning is called looming, where the signal increases in or more dimensions over time. Looming warning signals have been shown to produce low response times, likely because the recipient perceives the signal as a potential approaching threat, prompting defensive reactions (Graziano and Cooke, 2006). The present study evaluates the effect of veridical (intensity increases at the rate of closure with the lead vehicle) and high urgency (intensity increases at a rate of Time to Collision minus 0.5 seconds) looming FCW, as well as a static FCW, on drivers’ brake reaction times in the presence of a secondary texting task. Participants’ brake reaction times were recorded as they followed a lead car in a driving simulator, encountering multiple sudden-braking events across the five conditions (a control condition as well as four counterbalanced conditions using a secondary texting task). In the four conditions with a secondary task, participants received no FCW, static FCW, veridical FCW, and high-urgency FCW, respectively. Performance data was analyzed using a repeated measures ANOVA, and a series of pairwise comparisons were then made using Bonferroni corrected pairwise t-tests. The presence of a visually and manually distracting secondary task (texting) seems to diminish the performance of the looming signals as compared to previous studies that did not use a distraction component. While looming FCW do seem to effectively lower BRTs when the driver is distracted, it is recommended that further research investigate the relationship between secondary task types and their respective levels of distraction, and the effectiveness of auditory looming FCW. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Applied Psychology 2016

abstract: The issue of women driving remains to be highly debated in Saudi Arabia. Recent developments on its legalization have sparked conversation and discourse, particularly in social media sites like Twitter. Several hashtags have been used to indicate either support or criticism towards the movement. Examining Twitter tweets and hashtags, the study explored how the discourse on women driving had been executed, particularly in between genders. The study analyzed a sizeable number of tweets as well as their context via linguistic corpora analysis. Following Norman Fairclough’s framework, the two opposing perspectives were investigated both at a level of textual analysis. The selected tweets were representative of the three hashtags that emerged on the heat of the discourse regarding the issue of women driving in Saudi Arabia: #Women_car_driving, #I_will_drive_my_car_June15, and #I_will_enter_my_kitchen_June15. The results showed, among others, that tweets with the hashtag #Women_car_driving presented a tremendous support towards the movement. On the other hand strong opposing reactions emerged from the hashtags #I_will_drive_my_car_June15 and #I_will_enter_my_kitchen_June15. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Linguistics and Applied Linguistics 2017

Thesis (MTech (Education)) --Cape Technikon, Cape Town, 1992 / The oil crises in the nineteen seventies led to deliberate attempts to save fuel. The technological development of more energy efficient vehicles by motor manufacturers in leading overseas countries resulted in substantial fuel savings. Experts in this field however, feel that further large scale technological improvements in the manufacturing of motor vehicles during the nineties will not be cost effective. For this reason improved driver training is now being considered. In order to devise an appropriate strategy for the development of a driver training programme to promote fuel efficiency various curriculum development models were evaluated, and on the basis of the chosen model, the need for such a programme was further investigated. At present South Africa has no compulsory training for light motor vehicle drivers. Therefore the degree to which existing voluntary training programmes presented in South Africa include the development of fuel efficient driving techniques, was examined. In addition, effective fuel efficient driver training programmes from abroad were obtained and evaluated. These programmes were used to identify deficiencies in local programmes. On the basis of these investigations a set of guidelines was proposed for the formulation of a training programme to promote fuel efficiency on the part of light motor vehicle drivers. The training programme was devised with due consideration to the current state of driver training in the RSA, possible future developments, as well as the needs of various institutions which might use this programme. The completed training programme, consisting of a students' manual and a supplementary video tape, is presented in separate modules to be used either in their own right or on an integrated basis with existing training material. The students' manual and the supplementary video tape were subjected to critical evaluation by a panel of experts in terms of technical quality and content. It is suggested that the proposed programme could be implemented by the School Driver Education Programme, formal driver training schools as well as by individuals in association with the K53 system.

Le vieillissement de la population conduit à de nouveaux enjeux sociétaux. Une des implications de ce vieillissement concerne la question du maintien de la mobilité des plus âgés afin de préserver leur autonomie le plus longtemps possible. Jusqu'à présent et pour quelques décennies encore, l'essentiel de la mobilité est assurée par l'usage de la voiture. La conduite automobile est une activité complexe qui requiert des capacités sensorielles, fonctionnelles mais aussi des capacités cognitives. Or le vieillissement, même normal, s'accompagne d'une légère détérioration de ces différentes fonctions. Les personnes âgées sont toutefois peu impliquées dans les accidents corporels de la route. En effet, pour beaucoup de conducteurs, la mise en place de stratégies de régulation de la conduite leur permet de continuer à conduire de manière sécuritaire. Ces stratégies consistent en une diminution de leur exposition routière, en diminuant le nombre de kilomètres qu'ils parcourent ou en évitant certaines situations de conduite, avec à terme un arrêt définitif de la conduite. La littérature montre que ce processus de régulation se met en place progressivement dans l'âge et s'accentue avec l'aggravation des déficits. Elle montre également que ce processus se met en place différemment chez les hommes et chez les femmes. Le but de cette thèse est d'approfondir les recherches déjà menées sur le processus de régulation chez les hommes et les femmes âgés, en prenant en compte des déficits sensoriels, physiques et cognitifs, et en s'intéressant particulièrement à la pré-démence et à la démence. Ainsi, nous montrons que les femmes régulent plus, plus tôt, et pour des raisons difficiles à appréhender, alors que les hommes régulent davantage leur conduite en fonction de leur état de santé. Du fait que plus de femmes s'arrêtent de conduire à un stade pré-démentiel, la démence ne joue pas sur la restriction de leur activité de conduite, en distance parcourue ou en évitements de situations de conduite. Elle impacte directement l'arrêt de la conduite. En revanche, chez les hommes qui s'arrêtent moins en phase pré-démentielle, la démence impacte tout le processus de régulation de la conduite, de la restriction à l'arrêt. Concernant les déficits cognitifs, ils ont un effet sur le début du processus de régulation de la conduite des hommes comme des femmes, mais pas sur l'arrêt de la conduite des femmes car elles s'arrêtent avant une dégradation de ces fonctions. D'autres facteurs vont impacter la régulation de la conduite des hommes comme celle des femmes, et d'autres facteurs ont un effet spécifique chez les hommes ou chez les femmes. Notre travail aura contribué à mieux comprendre le processus de régulation dans son ensemble chez les hommes et chez les femmes séparément. Une des perspectives de ce travail sera d'étudier les conséquences de l'arrêt de la conduite avec des conséquences probablement différentes chez les hommes et les femmes. démence ; pré-démence ; facteurs associés ; 3-Cités ; MG-Cog CAPA ; SAFEMOVE / Abstract With increased life expectancy comes an aging of the population, and creates new societal challenges. One challenge of demographic aging is to maintain the independence and mobility of seniors for as long as possible. Today, and likely for decades to come, the private automobile is often the mainstay of personal mobility. Driving a car remains a complex activity, requiring sensory and functional capacities, and also certain cognitive capacities. But the aging process causes a progressive deterioration of these various capacities. In spite of which seniors remain under-represented in road trauma statistics! This can be explained by senior drivers adapting they driving habits in favor of better safety. Typical adaption strategies aim to reduce their exposure to traffic dangers, by driving less and by avoiding at-risk situations, ending up by not driving at all. Available study-reports suggests that such a strategy of adaption occurs progressively, as a reaction to the aging process, and so is accentuated by aggravation of a driver's deficiencies. This literature also suggests that the adaption process may occur differently for men and for women. The aim of the current study has been to further investigate the process of adaption, for senior men and women. Taking into account the decline of sensory, physical and cognitive capacities and with particular attention to the periods just before and after the onset of geriatric senility. Hence we establish that women adapt more their driving habits, and sooner too but for no obvious reason, whilst men tend to adapt in closer correlation with their state of health. As there are many women who have stopped driving already before senility, senility is not then a major influence on the distances they drive nor the situations they avoided, but rather impacts directly the decision to stop driving. Regarding cognitive deficiencies, they influence the adaption process right from the start, both for men and for women, but do not explain that women cease to drive long before a significant decline has occurred. Certain other factors influence the strategies of adaption for both men and women alike, whilst there are still other factors having a specific effect either on men or else on women. Our work in this study has led to a better understand of the adaption process (of driving habits by seniors), as a whole, and for men and women separately. A possible follow-on would be to investigate the impact that ceasing to drive then has, probably different, on the lives of men and of women

Mikroelektromekaniska system eller MEMS, används i allt större utsträcknining i fordon för att samla mätresultat om vinkel samt acceleration som sedan kan användas i samband med andra system i fordonet för ökad säkerhet och stabilitet. I bilar har smarta system använts sedan länge för airbag-system och ABS bromsar. Då just MEMS-sensorer har fördelar som pris, storlek och tillgänglighet ses allt fler möjligheter även för utveckling kring motorcyklar. Målet med detta projekt har varit att ta fram en prispressad och lite enklare produkt där föraren kan se information om sin lutning och acceleration med hjälp av en accelerometer och gyroskop . Tester har gjorts med produkten fastmonterad på motorcykel på data såsom lutning och acceleration efter ett så kallat komplementärfilter. Detta har gjorts för att se vilka värden på filtret som fungerar bäst för en eventuell färdig produkt. Utifrån testerna kan man utgöra att motorvibrationer har en påverkan för mätning av acceleration och vinkel. Dessa minskar i viss mån med vibrationsdämpande lösningar såsom gummiupphängningar men för att kunna få ut mätbara värden implementeras ett mjukvaru lågpassfilter samt ett komplementärfilter.

Abstract The proportion of single-parent families has increased in the last few decades world-wide, mostly due to high divorce rates. Also in Finland growing numbers of children spend part of their childhood in single-parent families. The aim of this study was to investigate in a longitudinal perspective, the possible long-term effects of the childhood family structure on psychological, physical and criminal outcomes of an offspring during adulthood. A large, prospectively collected general population birth cohort (n= 11 017), the Northern Finland 1966 Birth Cohort, was used as a study population. This database provided the information on childhood family structure of cohort members with additional information of sociodemographic factors of the family and of the child. Information concerning physical and psychiatric illnesses were gathered from the Finnish Hospital Discharge Register (FHDR). Death certificates and the information from national crime registers were also obtained. Females with a single-parent family background were more commonly hospital-treated (61.3 % vs. 56.7 %) for any physical condition than females with a two-parent family background. For males such difference in overall physical illness was not found. Both females and males from single-parent families had more commonly been hospital-treated for some diagnoses in the ICD-category of "injury and poisoning" than had other cohort members. Furthermore, females from single-parent families had also more commonly been treated due to pregnancy-related conditions such as induced abortions. During the follow-up time (16 to 28 years of age) 117 (90 males, 27 females) cohort members had died. Males with single-parent family background exhibited an increased mortality risk, especially due to suicides (OR=2.5, 95% CI 1.1-5.8, adjusted for psychiatric hospital diagnosis, parental social class). Criminality was more common among both males and females from single-parent families compared with other cohort members. The results showed that the risk of violent offending and recidivism was increased up to 8-fold if the cohort male member had been born and raised in a single-mother family over most of his childhood. Parental divorce also doubled the risk for both violent and recidivistic offending. Non-violent offences among males were associated only with parental death and divorce. Furthermore, drunk driving was more common among both males and females with single-parent background. Males who were born into single-mother families were at the highest risk of drunk driving offences in adulthood (OR=2.4, 95% CI 1.4-4.2, adjusted for maternal age, psychiatric hospital diagnosis, parental social class). In this study it was shown that young adults with single-parent families in childhood experienced a more stressful pathway from late adolescence to adulthood. However, most of the offspring of single-parent families did well during the follow-up time. Strategies to promote the well-being of children and adolescents in single-parent families are of prime importance for preventive health care.

Magister Public Health - MPH / Background: Road Traffic Accidents (RTAs) are an important cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, especially in low and middle-income countries. Traffic police reports indicate that RTAs are amongst the commonest health challenges Swaziland faces. Assessing the magnitude of the challenge, understanding the impact on public health and gaining more insight into the actual risk factors involved in RTAs, and especially RTAs that result in serious injuries and fatalities, is important for the road transport authority, the traffic police and for public health planners, in order to improve road safety, to develop effective countermeasures and to improve preparedness for effective health care, respectively. There is an insufficiency of studies on risk factors associated with RTAs, and particularly those associated with serious and fatal RTAs, in Sub-Saharan countries in general and Swaziland specifically. Manzini, a busy small city in Swaziland with a population of 61000 and an estimate of approximately 12000 vehicles on its roads daily is the setting for this study. RTAs in Manzini, are considered as a major public health problem with many people either seriously injured or killed on the roads annually. Aim: The aim of this study was to determine the human (e.g. age, gender, speeding and drunk driving), vehicle (e.g. vehicle types and vehicle defects), infrastructural (e.g. type of roads, road surface defects and road lighting) and environmental risk factors (e.g. rain and darkness) associated with serious and fatal RTAs in Manzini city and surrounding suburbs in Swaziland. Methodology: A case control study, based on data collected from RTA records at Manzini Traffic Police Station, was conducted. The study population was all RTAs in Manzini, with cases being RTAs that resulted in serious or fatal injuries, while RTAs with no injuries (vehicle and property damage only) and minor injuries were categorised as controls. A sample size of 294 consisting of all 143 RTAs with fatal and serious injury that occurred from July 2013 to June 2015 in Manzini city as cases and a random sample of 151 controls from amongst the minor injury and property damage only RTAs, was selected. A standardised data extraction tool was used to collect data from routine traffic police records on all RTAs. Frequencies were calculated for categorical variables. Numerical variables were summarised mathematically, via their central tendencies and distribution as well as collapsed into meaningful categories. Bivariate analysis to ascertain odds ratios was undertaken and all risk factors that showed a significant association with severe and fatal RTAs were further assessed via multivariate logistic regression analysis. Ethical approval for the study was secured from the Swaziland National Ethics Committee and the University of the Western Cape Research and Ethics committee. Results: Factors that had an unconfounded association on multivariate analysis with serious/fatal RTAs, compared to minor RTAs, were: male drivers (AOR = 5.48; 95% CI = 1.63 – 18.43); drivers not wearing a seatbelt (AOR = 5.07; 95% CI = 2.39 – 10.74); pedestrian error (AOR = 2.66; 95% CI = 1.46 – 4.86); accidents occurring on weekends (AOR 3.62; 95% CI = 2.07- 6.33); and accidents occurring between 18:00 – 23:59 time of the day (AOR = 11.68; 95% CI = 4.49 - 30.39). Other factors such as: age of driver, no driver's license at the accident scene, drunk-driving, seasons of the year, driver error, vehicle type, vehicle defect, road surface type, road surface condition, weather condition, street light condition and urban/rural location were not found to be associated with serious/fatal RTAs in our study. Limitations Limitations of the study were that some data collected at the scene of the accident were incomplete and not collected in a standardised manner (alcohol use, speeding, vehicle defects, road defects and environmental factors) and that there was probable misclassification of some serious/fatal RTAs as minor ones and under-reporting of minor RTAs. Also several variables which may affect the severity of RTAs, such as educational level, socioeconomic status, medical illness, marital status and emotional status of the driver, were not routinely collected by the traffic police department and hence were not assessed. Conclusions and Recommendations: Modifiable risk factors that had an unconfounded positive association with serious/fatal RTAs were not using a seatbelt, night-time driving, weekend driving and pedestrian error, while male gender might be a proxy for reckless driving. Hence, education programmes for drivers and the public on behavioural change encouragement, improving pedestrians' road safety by provision of pedestrian sidewalks and crossing sites, coupled with increased traffic law enforcement at critical days and times, may result in reduction of serious/fatal RTAs.