Cross-cultural differences in drivers’ behaviour: a driving simulator study

This paper presents the results of a cross-cultural study carried out with the intent of finding out which, among culture and road environment, has a greater influence on driver behaviour. To achieve this, the driving style of Nigerians with no experience of driving in the UK was compared to that of Nigerians with some experience of driving in the UK and to British drivers. It was hypothesised that those Nigerian drivers with no experience of driving in a highly regulated UK road system would not be encouraged to adopt a safe driving style. This would have implications for the use of road safety interventions in Nigeria that have been developed outside the Nigerian context. A driving simulator experiment was designed and carried out, comparing the driving style of these three groups of drivers in different conditions. The conditions varied depending on how much regulation was provided (low and high infrastructure). Data were analysed using R version 3.5.1 and SPSS version 24. Generally, results showed that there were distinct differences in behaviour between all the groups in most of the traffic scenarios. Nigerian drivers were more likely to engage in unsafe driving behaviours compared to other drivers. Improvements in the road environment did not bring about any significant changes in the behaviour of Nigerian drivers. There were no significant differences in the behaviour of Nigerian drivers with some experience of driving in the UK and that of British drivers in almost all scenarios. The results indicate that the behaviours of drivers are interpretable in relation to their traffic safety culture, and are partly influenced by their driving environment.