Should licences be issued in stages? Ray Fuller looks at the benefits of graduated licensing, now in places in several countries
Inexperienced drivers crash more than others. As they gather experience, they become better at recognising hazards, how dangerous situations are created, and predicting how other road users behave.
But how to get this necessary experience safely, without loss of vehicle control and without colliding with something or someone? Driving while supervised by an experienced driver is one solution. And graduated licensing is one way of requiring extended supervised experience before being allowed to go solo.
Graduated licensing takes the "learning driver" through steps in which the level of difficulty and the driver's licensed responsibility increase in a careful sequence. A system might have these steps:
1 LEARNER'S PERMIT: Supervision is required at all times. There may be restrictions on maximum speed and on carrying teenage passengers. There may be zero BAL tolerance and exclusion from night-time and motorway driving. No crashes or convictions must occur if the driver is to progress - either event puts him or her right back to square one. This period includes basic driver training and education. To be eligible to progress to the next level, the learner's permit must be held for a minimum period, a minimum amount of supervised driving must be completed and logged and the learner must pass the intermediate-licence driving test.
2 INTERMEDIATE LICENCE: Restrictions are progressively removed at this stage. Supervised motorway driving and driving at night may be allowed, but there may still be restrictions on carrying teenage passengers and zero BAL tolerance. No crashes or convictions must occur if the driver is to progress. This period includes more advanced training and education. To progress to the next level, the intermediate licence must be held for a minimum period, a minimum amount of supervised driving under specified conditions must be completed and logged and the learner must pass the full-licence driving test.
3 FULL LICENCE: All driving restrictions are removed except, of course, for applicable laws.
Such a system guarantees increased time in supervised behind-the-wheel training during daylight and night-time hours on all types of roadway. The requirement for supervision and other restrictions help create a lower risk environment for the driver. Motivation to practise and maintain safe skills and behaviour is sustained by requiring a crash-free and conviction-free performance in order to progress to the intermediate and final licence.
By making de-restriction contingent on a good record, graduated licensing provides a powerful incentive to drive safely. For young drivers, the worst sanction may be the delay that keeps them in an earlier stage longer, especially if their peers advance to the next level.
The indispensable partner of graduated licensing is graduated training, progressing from basic to more advanced levels of knowledge and skill in a controlled, paced, extended, supervised and rigorously assessed manner.
Developments along these lines in Ireland are already advanced in the Steer Clear driver education programme, designed by the Irish Drivers' Education Association (IDEA), which plans to launch it with 17- and 18-year-olds in some second-level schools on an experimental basis. Does this kind of programme work? The evidence is heartening. In several countries, graduated licensing has reduced accident involvement of new drivers by up to 16 per cent.
Full graduated systems have now been introduced in at least 24 states in the US, where it is now officially recommended by the US National Transportation Board, and in several states in Canada and Australia.
Full or partial graduated systems operate in New Zealand, Sweden, Norway, Finland, France and Northern Ireland.
Not all countries have been equally successful - nobody knows the "best" system or if there is such a thing (it may be culturally defined).
Access to suitably qualified and motivated supervision may be a problem for some learning drivers, although most studies have shown that both learners and parents rate graduated systems highly. It all looks very much like progress.
There is yet another solution to the problem - in a virtual world. Developing drivers need to be able to make mistakes, but without disastrous consequences. Virtual reality (VR) simulation provides an exciting alternative of great potential.
VR can compress months of real experience by systematically exposing the driver to a programme of key hazards. Drivers can learn the consequences of inappropriate behaviour, such as driving too fast. Enhanced feedback can be provided, such as re-running a sequence, viewing a sequence from outside the vehicle or from the perspective of other road users, slowing down action for easier understanding and demonstrating correct procedures.
We know it works for airline pilots. Why not drivers?
The application of this technology has been delayed by the cost of moving-base simulators. But that cost has now dropped dramatically to a level where the introduction of prototypes is a short step from becoming commercially viable.
Research and development are currently underway in several countries to deliver precisely this kind of VR tool for driver training - last year Britain introduced advanced simulators for truck and bus drivers.
VR technology could also be useful as an adjunct to driver testing, providing for a systematic and objective assessment of a driver's competence in a range of critical situations, including driving at night, at speed, and in varying visibility and road conditions.
• Ray Fuller is Associate Professor of Psychology at TCD