Abstract
IN view of the increasing attention which is being directed to road accidents and their causes and prevention, a pamphlet recently issued by the National Institute of Industrial Psychology dealing with practical methods for reducing accidents and transport costs is worthy of general attention. The difficulty of ascertaining accurately the ability of a driver is widely realised, but the way in which his accident record may be misleading and lead to unfair judgments of his ability is less well known. As a result of a considerable amount of research, the Institute has now been able to devise and standardise a group of psychological tests which can be applied to select the best drivers from among a group of applicants for a post. The results of the tests have shown a remarkable concordance with estimates based on close observation of actual driving performance. The tests are equally valuable for selecting the men most suitable for training as drivers and they can also be applied to discover what is lacking in drivers of poor ability in order to remedy deficiencies where possible. A fourth direction of application is of even wider interest as the tests can be used to advise those who intend to learn to drive as to what degree of ability they are likely to develop after adequate tuition and experience. The bearing of such tests on the prevention of road accidents is obvious. The Institute's fee for carrying out such a test is two guineas.
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Reduction of Road Accidents. Nature 132, 927 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/132927a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/132927a0