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Missouri's Take a Seat, Please! and program evaluation
G H Land1, J C Romeis, K N Gillespie
1Missouri Department of Health, Jefferson City, USA.
Insights
Child passenger safety laws in Missouri saw low compliance. A public reporting program, Take a Seat, Please!, did not improve adherence to child safety seat regulations for children under four.
Area of Science:
- Public Health
- Injury Prevention
- Child Safety
Background:
- Motor vehicle crash injuries are the leading cause of death for children aged 1-4 in Missouri.
- Despite child passenger safety legislation enacted in 1984, compliance remained low by 1992.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the effectiveness of the "Take a Seat, Please!" program in improving child passenger safety law compliance.
Main Methods:
- The "Take a Seat, Please!" program involved citizen reporting of non-compliant motorists.
- Effectiveness was assessed using a telephone survey and pre- and post-observation studies at child care centers.
Main Results:
- The intervention program showed no significant effect on compliance with child passenger safety laws.
- Neither the telephone survey nor the observational studies indicated a positive impact of the program.
Conclusions:
- The "Take a Seat, Please!" program was ineffective in increasing adherence to child passenger safety legislation.
- The program was discontinued due to lack of demonstrated impact.
Abstract:
In Missouri, injuries from motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death to children aged one to four. In 1984, the state legislature enacted child passenger safety legislation, but by 1992, compliance with the law was still disappointingly low. The Missouri Department of Health implemented a program called Take a Seat, Please! in which concerned citizens reported motorists who transported children under age four in a way not compliant with the state law. Two years later, a telephone survey and a pre- and postobservation study at child care centers did not show that the intervention had any effect. The program was discontinued in September 1995.