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A remarkable fact that is already quite well known is that in child pedestrian accidents, about 36% are girls and 64% are boys. This percentage does not seem to be changing over time.

Now, it's more or less impossible to imagine that motor vehicle drivers are responsible for selecting boys to crash into. Instead it must be different child pedestrian behaviours causing the difference.

If only we could get the boys to behave like the girls we'd save 1/3rd of child pedestrian crashes at a stroke.

Of course if we could get those that do get injured to behave more like the vast majority that don't get injured we'd save many more.

The following KSI figures apply to child pedestrians age groups:



Clearly the larger problem applies to older children who are more likely to be capable of being educated in road safety. The very young children should be better protected by their parents in many cases.

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Paul Smith
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Do we know what proportion of each age group the figures represent? If there are way more 11-15 year olds than younger children in total in the UK population then this could scew the figures into making it looks like older children are over represented.

Laudable goal, but how can we achieve that? Another remarkable gender difference appears later in life – figures show that women drivers are far safer than men. Men commit almost all the most serious offences! If only we could get the men drivers to behave like the women drivers, we could reduce the number of death or bodily harm offences by 80 to 90% straight off the top. Incredible, isn’t it?

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Not really. The way to get men drivers to behave like women drivers would be to tell them to drive less miles, as that accounts for much of the apparent disparity!

But it seems unlikely that children are similarly affected. I wouldn't imagine that boys spend twice as much time on the roads as girls, (although this may be a contributory factor).

But who knows, it may even be the case that initiatives taken to educate the boys to be more "road-wise" or whatever might also have a useful spin-off benefit when they are older and driving!

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Not so quick, JT. Men would have to drive 32 times as many miles as women do in order to explain the excessive number of dangerous driving offences men commit, so that is not the answer. But every bit counts, so we must tell men to ask their wives, sisters and girlfriends to drive them about!

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Not so quick, Basingwerk. If those offences were related to crash risk then we'd have 32 times more men crash involoved (or causing or casualties or whatever) than women. We don't, so maybe we should be asking the women to take lessons in "getting away with it" from the men?

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Paul Smith
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It may not be twice as much, but from observation I'm sure boys spend significantly more time on the streets than girls.

Also it's well known that boys are more likely to indulge in reckless, risk-taking behaviour.

Boys and men probably have far more sports-related injuries for precisely the same reasons.

Therefore this research seems to be basically a statement of the bleeding obvious and doesn't contain any new insights.

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Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

I've got births figures somewhere, I'll try and dig them out. But I'm pretty certain that the lion's share of the differences are to do with changing behaviour with age.

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Paul Smith
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Good question. It's one I had in mind when I made the original post. We probably can't, of course, but we still need to ask the question, otherwise we won't know that we can't.

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Paul Smith
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Good question. It's one I had in mind when I made the original post. We probably can't, of course, but we still need to ask the question, otherwise we won't know that we can't.[/quote]

In the light of recent stories relating to girls behaviour, I'd suggest it might also be a case of preventing the girls from becoming as bad as the boys.

Slow down, SafeSpeed! The studies I have seen (admittedly rather old American and Australian ones) consistently indicate that women drivers are much less likely than men to have a crash, but when corrected for miles travelled there is not a great deal of difference. So JT has a point - one way of making the roads safer (which is our goal here) is to drive less.

But when we consider fatal crashes, males are more (1.5 to 2 times more) likely than women to get themselves or someone else killed (although there is a period of parity for elderly drivers). You’ll have to explain why you extrapolate linearly to expect 32 times as many crashes (?), but the massive disparity in driving offences eventually plays out in the fatality numbers, even when corrected for distance. I was surprised to see that the Australian report has some strange quirks e.g. more women involved in SI crashes, but the numbers are not as compelling as the fatals. The US report shows a clear trend.

As for the children, we need to tackle that by helping the boys and their parents, and also by nicely asking drivers to reduce the overall risk for all sexes. If drivers can’t do that, then parents will be entitled to demand a traffic system with cameras, humps, mini-roundabouts, obstacles etc. to force them to slow down.

Reports:

http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30 ... eSex96.pdf

http://www.tuti.com.au/PUBLICATIONS/200 ... hRates.pdf

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Back up basingwerk! You know very well that's not what we were talking about. We were talking about the male female ratio of dangerous driving offenses.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
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I did have a quick look to see if I there was any sign of the ratio changing over time, but I didn't find any such sign. It seems remarkably consistent.

I looked at spot KSI figures for 1985, 1996 and 2003. The ratio was the same within 0.5% for each of the three sample years.

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Paul Smith
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That's a bit strong for you isn't it Peter?

I think we have to explore these things to see if there is any opportunity for insight. I also expect that quite a few readers were unaware of the sex differences in child pedestrian accidents. (Although it is well known in certain circles).

I don't believe for a second that there are twice as many boy pedestrians as girl pedestrians for any normal pavement sample. There might be groups of lads hanging around sometimes, but I see groups of girls too.

I do think girls are more risk averse, but I suspect the major effect is better attention from the girls (probably due to risk aversion), rather than the more obvious direct risk taking behaviour.

I'm saying that many of these accidents will be more down to carelessness than recklessness on the part of the child pedestrian. Girls may be less careless because they are more risk averse.

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Paul Smith
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It's a bit of a "Basil Fawlty" response that maybe should have had a smiley

All I meant is that it is fairly obvious to anyone who has dealings with children that girls are, on average, less inclined than boys to act recklessly and take physical risks. Therefore it is no surprise to find girls under-represented in casualty statistics.


Yes, there are plenty of girls, but I wouldn't be surprised if the ratio of under-16s hanging around the streets was something like 60% boys, 40% girls.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

There is a very simple answer to all this, teach kids roadsense, the green cross code, forget the stupid hedgehogs, they are always getting flattened.
In fact teach all pedestriand roadsense and that even though they will be able to sue for mega-bucks, it won't be the driver sat in a wheelchair for the rest of their lives.
Personal responsibility is what it's all about.

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Yeah, maybe, but we also have an awful lot of activity that's much more likely to be equal. Take going to school as an example. I bet the numbers walking are very similar between boys and girls. When one considers the full range of child pedestrian activity, I can't see there's going to much difference.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Rather think more boys hang around the roads than girls. As parents we tend to be a little more protective of our daughters in any case. I am a little stricter with my 15 year old daughter than I am with her twin brother as far as going out is concerned. Perhaps she brings out the paternal protective instinct in me But she is a pretty girl and even in a nice rural area like Keswick ... one keeps aware of potential dangers to a young girl.

As you know - have five children of my own - eldest boy is 17, twin boy and girl are 15, my youngest son is 6 and we now have a baby girl. Also am the legal guardian of an 11 year old girl and a 4 year old boy.

I would agree that my girls are a little more cautious in everything they attempt, and my sons "get stuck in!" And perhaps again it is the "male" risk taking element as well.

As pointed out by Dratsabasti - firmer and more constant Green Cross Code education - pointing out the stupidity of playing chicken, crossing between parked cars, moonwalking across the road ... would all help in this particular battle.

And what artificially inflates that statistic?

Joyriders, underage drivers, Motorists taking part in criminal activity, ie, evading capture are largely MEN

and what types of people are most likley to crash or kill?

I think I once heard that women have better peripheral vision than men. If I didn't imagine it, and if it's as true for girls as it is for adult women, then that could be part of the reason. That sort of thing won't change in the same way other factors might. Or maybe they really are just brighter than us poor males.

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