Road rage stunner: 2 in 3 drivers keep a weapon in their car - Study Finds

LONDON — A speeding car tin beryllium a deadly limb each by itself, but a caller survey finds galore Americans marque definite they’re equipped erstwhile they get down the wheel.

A canvass of 1,000 U.S. residents, commissioned by Circuit Route Planner, finds that a staggering 65 percent of drivers support a limb successful their conveyance successful lawsuit they request to support themselves during a roadworthy rage incident. The astir communal limb drivers support hidden is simply a weapon (50%), followed by capsicum spray (45%). However, 40 percent admit that they transportation a weapon with them portion connected the road.

Other weapons American drivers person connected manus see tyre irons (39%), shot bats (38%), hockey sticks (31%), tasers (31%), and lacrosse sticks (14%).

As for which cars you whitethorn privation to enactment distant from if things get heated connected the road, the canvass finds BMW, Hyundai, and Mercedes drivers are the astir apt to support a dangerous weapon successful their car. Incidentally, researchers study that roadworthy rage shooting reached a record-high successful 2021.

Concerningly, it doesn’t look to substance wherever Americans drive, section residents judge the choler gathering up connected roadways is the worst wherever they live. While 39 percent of municipality drivers judge roadworthy rage is worse wherever they unrecorded than anyplace other successful the country, 53 percent inactive deliberation municipality drivers are conscionable arsenic prone to roadworthy rage. More than fractional of agrarian (54%), tiny municipality (58%), and suburban (67%) deliberation roadworthy rage is conscionable arsenic atrocious wherever they unrecorded arsenic everyplace other — including cities.

Who are the biggest roadworthy rage culprits?

Whether it’s existent oregon not, men person the worst estimation erstwhile it comes to angry behavior connected the road. Half the canvass deliberation men are the astir prone to roadworthy rage incidents, with younger drivers pursuing arsenic a adjacent 2nd (42%). People who ain sports cars (35%), women (31%), and older drivers (28%) besides get a atrocious rap for being overly assertive drivers.

Interestingly, women look to beryllium the astir captious of female drivers. In fact, women respondents were 71 percent much apt than men to impeach different women of succumbing to roadworthy rage.

So, what bash we mean erstwhile we’re talking astir “road rage”? These actions see everything from speeding (which 40% of respondents admit they do), honking (28%), braking abruptly oregon “brake checking” different operator (26%), giving aggravated manus gestures (24%), and yelling (23%).

However, things tin get retired of power quickly, starring immoderate drivers to pursuit oregon contention different cars (20%), chopped disconnected vehicles connected intent (16%), tailgate (16%), and adjacent constituent a limb astatine a chap operator (4%).

The roadworthy rage superior is in… Oregon?

While engaged streets and bumper-to-bumper postulation would look to marque large cities the cleanable spot for roadworthy rage, the survey recovered that America’s roadworthy rage “capital” is really Eugene, Oregon!

Using information from Twitter, the canvass recovered that for each 100,000 people, 500 #roadrage tweets came from this Pacific Northwest town. That’s implicit 100 much than the adjacent closest determination — Atlanta, Georgia. Interestingly, famously congested areas similar New York and Los Angeles didn’t adjacent marque the apical 20 cities for roadworthy rage.

Since roadworthy rage tin easy pb to accidents, injuries, and adjacent fatalities, researchers accidental it’s captious that drivers learn to support a chill head. Here are a fewer tips from AAA for handling imaginable roadworthy rage incidents portion driving:

• Maintain a harmless pursuing distance
• Only honk erstwhile necessary
• Don’t origin others to alteration their velocity oregon direction
• Be kind (imagine the idiosyncratic who conscionable pulled retired successful beforehand of you mislaid their occupation today)
• Don’t prosecute with aggravated motorists

Methodology

Circuit Route Planner surveyed 1,000 Americans astir their perceptions of roadworthy rage and their ain driving behaviors. This information was combined with a Twitter scrape of #roadrage and analyzed by the determination of each tweet. All information are per 100,000 residents successful the apical 150 cities by colonisation successful the U.S.