168｜PracticeAn educational program for better control ofemotions while driving
1. Background and goals
Negative emotions such as
irritation, impatience, andanger have been frequentlyindicated as causal factors in
accidents in various studies
on human factors. However,this issue tends to be treatedas an inattention error by thedriver or as a legal violation,and is rarely directly taken up
as an educational theme. In
this study, we address thisissue as a topic for driver edu-

Structure of theeducational program
Step 1: Introduction
Step 2: Self-evaluation
Step 3: Understanding stress theory
Step 4: Learning coping strategies
Step 5: Goals

Self-understanding
Enriching individual
resources

90 minutes

Figure 1. Overview of the educational program
cation. The goal of the project
was to develop an educational
program for better control of emotions and examine the effectiveness of the program (Fig. 1).
Emotional control is one of the most important skills required for safe driving and plays a domi-

nant role in other safe driving skills such as vehicle maneuvering and hazard perception according to ahierarchical model of driver behavior. However, it is difficult for a third party to determine what shouldbe learned in an educational program because emotional control skills are highly dependent on individual characteristics. The most important pedagogical point is to help learners understand their own emotional tendencies and to proactively develop emotional control strategies best suited to the individual.
This project aimed at providing opportunities for such learning, by developing an educational programfor improving emotional control skills.

Project Leader: Kazuhisa Ogawa
Professor, Teacher Training Center, Tohoku Institute of Technology

An educational program for better control of emotions while driving｜169

2. Research content
2-1. Methods
The research project consisted of two surveys. The participants in the surveys were 102 professional
drivers (average age 37.38 years) employed by transport and delivery service companies. The first survey
was conducted before and after implementation of the educational program to analyze changes in driving behavior using driving recorders attached to vehicles that the participants operated during daily
work. We also measured changes in participants’ awareness (stress reaction and feelings of self-efficacy)
before and after the program. We also conducted simple interviews one month after the program toinvestigate awareness changes following program participation. The second survey investigated onlychanges in awareness before and after participation in the educational program.
We used three question-Not very well

Not well at all

DifficultSomewhat difficult

Somewhat easy

Easy

used to identify which parts ofSomewhat welldegree to which the participant
thought the emotion applied
was taken as a measure of stress
reaction (Fig. 2). We also asked
participants to rate whether
they have been able to easily
cope with their emotional state,
and used this as a measure ofself-efficacy.
Questionnaire II was forevaluating the educational program. This questionnaire wasResponse B
How easy or difficult is it foryou to cope with thesecircumstances well?

Very wellnaires. Questionnaire I presented examples of emotional
states during driving, and theResponse A
How well do the following
statements describe your feelings
under the given circumstances?

1

Drivers who don’t thank me
when I yield to them are rude.

432143212

I suddenly become irritable when
I get caught in traffic when I’m busy.

43214321

3

When I’m trying to make a turn against
oncoming traffic but can’t find an opening,
I get very anxious due to the line of cars
piling up behind me.

432

143

2

1Figure 2. Part of questionnaire I

the program participants founduseful and to get information about their overall impressions regarding the program. We used the resultsof this questionnaire to evaluate acceptance of the educational program.
Questionnaire III was produced based on the Big Five theory(1) and was used to assess the personality traits of the participants.

(1) A recent theory for explaining personality. This theory categorizes the various personality traits into five dimensions: extroversion,neuroticism, openness to experience, conscientiousness, and agreeableness.

170｜Practice2-2. Results(1) Changes in stress reaction and self-efficacy
We calculated a scalingscore for eight items ofticipation in the educational program. Higherscores indicate a stronger
stress reaction and stronger

4

Average rating valueior. We converted this toaverage per-item scores andanalyzed changes after par-Average rating value

questionnaire I regarding
anger toward others’ behav-4323

2

Stress reaction
Self-efficacy
1Stress reaction
Self-efficacy
1

Before education After education

Anger at the behavior of others

Before education After education

Impatience due to time pressure

feelings of self-efficacy. As
Figure 3. Changes in stress reaction and self-efficacy following education
shown in Figure 3, stress
reaction was reduced afterprogram participation and feelings of self-efficacy were improved.
A similar analysis was performed on five items related to feeling rushed under the pressure of time,and rating scores were compared before and after program participation. For impatience, we also foundeffects of reduced stress reaction and increased feelings of self-efficacy after the program.
Analyzing the relation between age and changes in awareness indicated that age in particular was afactor that influenced feelings of impatience after the program. Both young participants (aged 30 years
or younger) and middle-aged participants (aged 31 years or older) indicated reduced stress reaction andimproved feelings of self-efficacy after the program, but the change was greater for the youngparticipants.
Analysis of the relationship between changes in awareness and personality traits of the participants
indicated no association with stress reaction. Regarding feelings of self-efficacy, however, a significantinteraction was found between feelings of anger and extroversion. We divided participants into twogroups of higher and lower extroversion scores. We found that changes in feelings of self-efficacy werelarger among the participants with higher extroversion scores. In other words, it was suggested that participants who tend to direct mental energy outward found it easier to cope with their anger toward otherroad users after the program.
(2) Participants’ evaluation of the educational program
Questionnaire II contained 17 question items posed as a 4-point Likert scale. Participants evaluated theprogram favorably: Over 80% of participants gave positive responses (“4: Agree” or “3: Somewhatagree”) for all question items.

An educational program for better control of emotions while driving｜171(3) Changes in driving behavior
No statistically significant changes were found regarding driving behavior of the participants following
the program.

3. Conclusions
Participation in the educational program resulted in reduced stress reaction regarding feelings of anger
and impatience. Such changes in awareness were particularly noticeable among young drivers. Also,
highly extroverted drivers showed particular improvement in feelings of self-efficacy to control anger.
Evaluation of the education program indicated high acceptance overall. However, no definite changes indriving behavior were observed.
In the future, it will be necessary to develop more sensitive measurement indicators for changes indriving behavior. A possible measurement method is to observe specific behaviors such as visual checking and stopping at an intersection when a stressful event occurs on the road. Another problem to besolved is the development of follow-up training to sustain the improvement in emotional control skills.
It is possible that the educational effects found in this study are only temporary changes. Finally, dissemination of this emotional control educational program requires development of a manual. We hope
to develop specific educational measures for organizing and resolving the many psychological problems
that drivers face.

4. Future outlook
In addition to continued verification of the educational effects, instructor training is a major issue
related to dissemination of this educational program. Traditional educational styles in which instructors
attempt to instill knowledge in learners are not suited to deriving self-understanding. In the future, itwill be necessary to plan instructor training workshops that provide learner-oriented instructional
methods such as coaching techniques.