Factors influencing drink driving intention among motorcyclists in Vietnam

Reducing drink driving amongst motorcyclists has been deemed as a potential area for improving road traffic safety in most developing countries. However, research efforts paid on determining the underlying factors of drink driving intention amongst this road user group has been still scant. To fill this gap, this study explored the factors influencing motorcyclists' intention to drink and drive in Vietnam.

A questionnaire survey was conducted with a sample of 451 Vietnamese motorcycle riders. The theory of planned behavior (TPB) was utilized as a frame of reference to address this issue. Apart from the TPB standard variables (i.e., attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control) and extended TPB variables which have been previously investigated in literature (i.e., descriptive norm, past behavior, and risk perception), the present research introduced four extended factors to TPB including social sanctions, physical loss, perception of drink driving enforcement, and perceived ability to influence traffic police to avoid punishment.

The results showed significant effects of attitudes toward drink driving, perceived behavioral control, past behavior and social sanctions on motorcyclists' drink driving intention. In addition, the data showed that both new context-based variables (i.e., "perception of drink driving enforcement" and "perceived ability to influence traffic police to avoid punishment") were significantly related to drink driving intention.

Various underlying factors of motorcyclists' intention to drink and drive were identified under the TPB framework. The findings provide useful information for road safety interventions in Vietnam. In particular, making enforcement activities more visible to motorcyclists and putting more effort into reducing corruption and other illegal activities in the traffic police sector could be effective measures for obtaining desirable drink driving behaviors.