Bicycle use entails high safety and health risks especially for adolescents. Most safety education programs aimed at adolescents focus on accident statistics and risk perceptions. This paper proposes the investigation of the social-cognitive correlates of risky cycling behaviours of adolescents prior to developing safety education programs. Secondary school students aged 13 to 18 years (n = 1446) filled out questionnaires regarding bicycle behaviour, risky intentions, accident experience, and social-cognitive determinants as suggested by the theory of planned behaviour. Regression analysis revealed that the proximal variables (i.e., self-efficacy, attitudes towards drunk driving, personal norm regarding safekeeping of self and others, and compared risk) were able to predict 17% of the variance of risky behaviour and 23% of the variance of risky intentions. The full model explained respectively 29% and 37% of the variance in risky behaviour and risky intentions. Adolescents with positive attitudes towards risky behaviour and low sense of responsibility report risky behaviour, even when having been (close to) an accident.Adolescents realize whether they are risk takers or not. This implies that the focus of education programs should not be on risk perceptions, but on decreasing positive attitudes towards alcohol in traffic and increasing sense of responsibility instead. Cognitions regarding near accidents should be studied, the role of safe cycling self-efficacy is unclear. (Author/publisher)
Samenvatting