The objective of this study was to determine the nature and prevalence of parental involvement with teen driving and its relationship to teen driving risk. A state-wide sample of 424 Maryland parents and their provisionally licensed teenagers were interviewed. Parents were unaware of the extent to which their teens had engaged in high-risk traffic events, such as being distracted by friends or driving too fast. Teens who were allowed unsupervised access to a car at least several times a week were 3 times as likely to have driven too fast than were those who had access once a month or less. The frequency of parental teaching of driving skills was not strongly related to teen risk taking. It is concluded that the need to increase parents' capacity to impose and enforce driving restrictions on provisionally licensed teen drivers is indicated. (Author/publisher)
Abstract