Psychological performance of accident-prone automobile drivers in China: a case-control study

To evaluate the role of neurobehavioural factors in the aetiology of recurrent automobile accidents, we administered the Revised Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS-R), the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ), and choice and simple reaction time tests to 31 accident-prone automobile drivers. These drivers who had caused three or more traffic accidents during the years 1980-1984, were selected from records of 2723 traffic accidents registered by Hefei Traffic Police Department during the years 1980-1984. The same tests were administered to an equal number of sex- and age-matched control drivers who had no reported involvement in automobile accidents. None of the subjects had suffered from any neuropsychiatric illness or head injury. Comparisons between the two groups indicated that for accident-prone drivers scores on picture completion and block design subtests of the WAIS-R were significantly lowered (p less than 0.05); scores for neurosis extrovert behaviour and psychosis (EPQ) were significantly higher (p less than 0.05); and the number of errors in the choice reaction time test was significantly higher (p less than 0.01). It is suggested that accident-prone drivers have lower psychological performance, poorer judgement and a higher tendency than safe drivers to be neurotic, extrovert and psychotic.