Attitudes, norms and driving behaviour: A comparison of young drivers in South Africa and Sweden

• We compare the attitudes and behaviour of young drivers in South Africa and Sweden.
• We query whether driving standards can be influenced by social or political pressures.
• South Africans displayed higher levels of risky driving than Swedish drivers.
• Poor driving is justified by them in terms of shifting social norms.
• Social norms are explained as the product of social, political and economic tensions.

Culture is increasingly recognised among traffic psychologists to be a factor influencing driving behaviour. This study examines whether a cultural background characterised by rapid social change and high levels of violence and aggression, as in the South African context, has any discernible influences on driving standards or the behaviour of individual drivers. The experiences and attitudes of young drivers in South Africa are compared with a group of young drivers from Sweden, a country whose society has exhibited high levels of stability and where road user behaviour is renowned for its restraint and compliance with regulations.The two cohorts provide information about their exposure to traffic injuries, their attitudes to other drivers and to a range of traffic offences, and to the types of behaviour they personally engage in. Among the South African respondents the notion of a declining standard of driving emerges very clearly, and specific new norms of driving are identified. Such norms are explained to be a consequence of new social values or challenges inherent within contemporary South African society.