Crash risk and aberrant driving behaviors among bus drivers: The role of personality and attitudes towards traffic safety Luca Mallia a, b, *, Lambros Lazuras a , Cristiano Violani c , Fabio Lucidi a a Department of Psychology of Development and Socialization Processes, Sapienza University of Rome, Via Dei Marsi 78, 00185 Rome, Italy b Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome “Foro Italico”, P.za Lauro de Bosis 15, 00135 Rome, Italy c Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, Via Dei Marsi 78, 00185, Rome, Italy A R T I C L E I N F O Article history: Received 3 December 2014 Received in revised form 25 February 2015 Accepted 23 March 2015 Available online xxx Keywords: Bus drivers Attitudes Errors Lapses Traffic violations Personality Accident risk A B S T R A H A C T Several studies have shown that personality traits and attitudes toward traffic safety predict aberrant driving behaviors and crash involvement. However, this process has not been adequately investigated in professional drivers, such as bus drivers. The present study used a personality–attitudes model to assess whether personality traits predicted aberrant self-reported driving behaviors (driving violations, lapses, and errors) both directly and indirectly, through the effects of attitudes towards traffic safety in a large sample of bus drivers. Additionally, the relationship between aberrant self-reported driving behaviors and crash risk was also assessed. Three hundred and one bus drivers (mean age = 39.1, SD = 10.7 years) completed a structured and anonymous questionnaire measuring personality traits, attitudes toward traffic safety, self-reported aberrant driving behaviors (i.e., errors, lapses, and traffic violations), and accident risk in the last 12 months. Structural equation modeling analysis revealed that personality traits were associated to aberrant driving behaviors both directly and indirectly. In particular altruism, excitement seeking, and normlessness directly predicted bus drivers’ attitudes toward traffic safety which, in turn, were negatively associated with the three types of self-reported aberrant driving behaviors. Personality traits relevant to emotionality directly predicted bus drivers’ aberrant driving behaviors, without any mediation of attitudes. Finally, only self-reported violations were related to bus drivers’ accident risk. The present findings suggest that the hypothesized personality–attitudes model accounts for aberrant driving behaviors in bus drivers, and provide the empirical basis for evidence-based road safety interventions in the context of public transport. ã 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Public transportation is a vibrant economic sector in the European Union, and transport through buses comes second to the use of passenger cars (Eurostat, 2014). According to a relevant report from the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA), professional drivers face an increased risk for road fatalities. Even light transport vehicles are twice as likely to be involved in crashes, as compared to passenger vehicles, and in most cases (85%), crash involvement is the result of human error (EU-OSHA, 2010). The risk of fatalities or serious injury for bus passengers is considerably lower than that of car passengers (Albertsson and Falkmer, 2005 Yang et al., 2009). In the European Union, bus and coach are the most widespread (12.10%) mode for passenger on land transportation, following car use (81.6%). However, the crashes involving bus and coaches in 2010 accounted only for the 0.36% of the total fatalities in crashes (0.52% for urban areas and 0.47% for rural areas; European Union Road Federation, 2012). Furthermore, the last decades witnessed a significant reduction of fatal crashes in bus/coach transportation, and one of the 10 goals of the European Union is to further improve public transportation and road safety by 2050 (European Union, 2011). To achieve this goal more focused research is needed on the risk factors for bus crashes. One way of looking at this is by attending to technical aspects, such as improving vehicle safety features (e.g., the length of the bus), the roadway (e.g., the presence of bus priority and/or a divided roads), as well as the environment (e.g., the traffic conditions and road congestion; Albertsson and Falkmer, 2005; Chimba et al., 2010; Goh et al., 2014). Another way of looking at improving bus transportation safety concerns driver characteristics and attributes. Specifically, factors * Corresponding author at: Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome “Foro Italico”, P.za Lauro de Bosis 15, 00135 Rome, Italy. Tel.: +39 06 36 733 36; Mobile: +39 3204570377. E-mail address: luca.mallia@uniroma4.it (L. Mallia). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.aap.2015.03.034 0001-4575/ ã 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Accident Analysis and Prevention 79 (2015) 145–151 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Accident Analysis and Prevention journal homepage: www.else vie r.com/locate /aa p