In The Netherlands each year about 1,300 people die in motor vehicle accidents. Total accident losses also include anything between time loss and hospital bills. The combat against accident losses traditionally involved the enhancement of the safety of the traffic hardware and the abilities of the road users. The starting point of the motivational approach to road safety is that road users hamper safety because they take to much risk. Therefore, it aims at motivating the road user to be more cautious. The first chapter of this thesis gives a review of theories developed in the traffic safety science and psychology that concern the psychological process of risk taking in traffic and the behaviour adaptation that may take place because of changes in traffic hardware. The chapters that follow present a total of seven experiments. The first four experiments were designed to make people decide what level of risk they were prepared to take under various incentive schemes. In the last three experiments people did not only chose the risk they are willing to take, but they also effectuated their willingness by simultaneously performing a skills task in a traffic simulator. Again different conditions of incentive schemes were evaluated. (A)
Abstract