Stop, Roll, or Run

Overview

Objectives/Goals I chose to investigate whether male or female drivers will respect a stop sign with a witness present. I found this interesting because in neighborhoods so many people do not come to a complete stop or just run right through a stop sign. This is a serious problem because it affects the lives of others. I wanted to find out how I could make these drivers stop like they are supposed to. I came up with different witnesses that are most likely to determine if drivers will stop or not. Methods/Materials To determine whether male or female drivers will stop more with a given witness, I first recorded my data without being visible to the drivers. The next day at the same time I used children as a witness and recorded data. Lastly, I used a camera as a witness and sat in view for the drivers to see and recorded data. Results The results were that women stop more than men at a stop sign with no witness. Men stopped more than women when children were out playing. Finally the last experiment, with a camera as the witness, showed that more women stopped at the sign. Without a witness present, women stopped 10 times out of 22 and men stopped only 5 times out of the 22 sampled. When children were present only 9 women out of 22 stopped at the sign. However, when the camera was visible more women stopped with 11 out of 22 women stopping at the sign. With the men drivers, when the children were present they stopped 11 times out of the 22. But when the camera was present men stopped only 8 times out of the 22 sampled. Conclusions/Discussion When completing this experiment I concluded that women are safer drivers than men but not by a lot. Men ran the sign more over the experiment with a ratio of 25:66 and women right behind with 20:66. The stopping ratio of men was 24:66 and the women stopped 30:66. Meaning women respect stop signs more than men. Both men and women stopped more often when some sort of witness was present. We can make neighborhoods and stop sign intersections safer for everyone by determining whether male or female drivers will stop and what witness will influence them the most. This project can be taken to another level, to change the roads and decrease the amount of car crashes. There by, making the world a safer place.

Competition history

• CSEF 2012 Behavioral & Social Sciences · Entry J0402

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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