Risk Assessment & Risk Taking Amongst Motorcyclists

The objectives of the project were:

• To study variations in attitudes to risk taking and understanding of risks across different social and demographic groupings of motorcyclists.
• To study the extent to which attitudes influence behaviour.
• To investigate variations between statistical risk assessments and motorcyclists’ assessment of risk.
• To identify those motorcyclists whose attitudes towards risk place them at risk.
• To provide recommendations on how future road safety campaigns could be better targeted towards high risk groups.

Most riders in this study said they were aware of, or willing to believe, objective estimates of motorcycling risk. Furthermore, they were willing to accept these levels of risk and few said they would consider giving up motorcycling because of them. It does not appear that, as a group, motorcyclists base their behaviour on grossly under-estimating the risks of motorcycling as an activity.

Three rider groups, identified on the basis of responses to a series of questions about the relative risk of motorcycling and car driving, give some insight into patterns of perception, and possible remedial actions:

* ‘Risk Deniers’ might be susceptible to improved information on the real risks of motorcycling provided it is presented in a convincing way – though educational measures designed to show that they themselves are not immune from this risk would also be needed.

• ‘Optimistic Accepters’ might be influenced by educational campaigns designed to bring home to them the true impact of motorcycle accidents on victims and their families. Measures designed to improve awareness of personal limitations and to reduce the belief that skill provides immunity from risk should also be useful. However, this group has a pattern of riding motives that also needs to be considered. One way to do this is by emphasising the link between such motives/goals and safety, so that riders are more able to take these into account. Another might be to find ways of promoting other riding goals that would reduce risk (see Sexton et al (2004b)). It may also be the case that, for some riders at least, it is unrealistic to expect educational and training measures to be very effective in reducing risk; and that if the government wishes to reduce their risk substantially, attention will also need to be given to engineering and enforcement-based measures.

• ‘Realistic Accepters’ may be the group most susceptible to educational and training interventions. Their self-assessment of their own risk is two-to-three times higher than the self-assessed risk of the other groups, they worry more about the risks than the other groups, and they are more aware that their own skills do not protect them from this risk.

It is probably not feasible or even desirable, to target each group with a different safety intervention. However, identifying the groups does give an indication of the types of content that need to be considered, and their potential effectiveness.