Road rage: What makes some people more prone to anger behind the wheel

Aggressive driving has become a topic of concern over the last few decades, and for good reason. In an analysis of 10,037 police reports and newspaper stories about traffic accidents that led to violence, the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety found “road rage” contributed to 218 deaths and 12,610 injuries between 1990 and 1996. Worse, AAA found that road rage incidents increased nearly 7% each year within that period.

Psychologists are studying what makes some people more prone to road rage and how to keep them from becoming a danger on the road. Research suggests that young males are the most likely to perpetrate road rage. Environmental factors such as crowded roads can boost anger behind the wheel. Certain psychological factors, including displaced anger and high life stress, are also linked to road rage. In addition, studies have found that people who experience road rage are more likely to misuse alcohol and drugs.

Understanding what fuels this dangerous behavior may help psychologists curb it. In studies of anger and aggressive driving, counseling psychologist Jerry Deffenbacher, PhD, of Colorado State University, found that people who identified themselves as high-anger drivers differ from low-anger drivers in five key ways.

• They engage in hostile, aggressive thinking. They’re more likely to insult other drivers or express disbelief about the way others drive. Their thoughts also turn more often to revenge, which sometimes means physical harm.
• They take more risks on the road. High-anger drivers are more likely to go 10 to 20 mph over the speed limit, rapidly switch lanes, tailgate, and enter an intersection when the light turns red.
• High anger drivers get angry faster and behave more aggressively. They’re more likely to swear or name-call, to yell at other drivers, to honk in anger. And they’re more likely to be angry not just behind the wheel, but throughout the day.
• High-anger drivers had twice as many car accidents in driving simulations. They also report more near-accidents and get more tickets for speeding.
• Short-fused drivers experience more trait anger, anxiety, and impulsiveness. Perhaps from work or home stress, high-anger drivers are more likely to get in the car angry; they also tend to express their anger outward and act impulsively.

Is road rage out of control? Not necessarily. While some studies have found that as many as one-third of drivers have experienced road rage, less than 2% report engaging in serious threats or violent behavior. Deffenbacher found that even people with the consistent cluster of high-anger driving traits stayed calm under certain road conditions—for example, when they drove down a simulated wide-open country road. Congestion and slowdowns seem to increase anger, but only for some drivers. There are large individual differences, so it appears to be the mix of temperament and environment that lights the fuse.

A combination of cognitive and relaxation techniques has shown promise for reducing road rage among high-anger drivers. Deffenbacher has taught applied relaxation coping skills and used cognitive restructuring, or reframing of negative events, to help high-anger drivers stay cool.

In a series of studies, high-anger drivers who wanted help attended eight therapy sessions involving either relaxation or cognitive-relaxation therapy. In the relaxation-only condition, the drivers learned deep breathing and other basic relaxation techniques. In the cognitive-relaxation therapy condition, drivers learned relaxation techniques as well as cognitive change strategies. Both groups practiced skills to better control their anger while visualizing frustrating driving situations, such as someone cutting them off in traffic. Then they practiced these skills when they were actually driving.

Deffenbacher found that both interventions were equally effective in curbing road rage. They couldn’t completely douse a driver’s anger, but they did reduce its frequency and intensity. What’s more, some studies found that a year after therapy, people continued to control their anger roughly as well as they had immediately after treatment and at a one-month follow-up.

In New York state in 1999, the University at Albany’s Center for Stress and Anxiety Disorders treated 20 aggressive drivers referred by the local district attorney’s office as well as 10 volunteers who described themselves as aggressive drivers. Tara Galovski, PhD, designed treatment sessions that included deep relaxation, stress-management coping skills, cognitive restructuring, and learning different ways to think about roadway events and stressors. These strategies have proven to help reduce anger and aggression, both behind the wheel and in general. The treatment group averaged a 64% drop in aggressive driving behaviors, and showed marked reductions on measures of psychological distress, a standardized Driving Anger Scale, and a Driver Stress Profile. At a follow-up three months later, the participants had maintained those improvements.