Are Women Better Drivers?

It’s an old joke, isn’t it, to belittle women drivers and laugh at their attempts at parallel parking? Yet statistics show that women are far safer drivers than men, in that they are involved in far fewer serious accidents.

Figures from the UK Department for Transport for 2007 (and don’t ask me why these are the most recent ones quoted because I don’t know) show that 530 women were involved in what is known as KSI (killed or seriously injured) accidents compared to 1,640 men. However, according to a report from the Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM), women are most vulnerable at junctions and are involved in more low-speed accidents than men. And don’t make the obvious comment that this is because they drive slower…

I suppose it depends on how you define ‘better drivers’, doesn’t it? Just because women are involved in fewer serious accidents but more low-speed ones, does that necessarily make them better? Men certainly break more traffic laws than women and are cited for reckless driving more often.

But because of these statistics, women are apparently losing out on driver training offered by their employers. Around 60% of both men and women either drive to or for their work but whereas a staggering 94% of men had been offered training to improve their driving by their employers, only 22% of women were offered the same. And it’s not as if they wouldn’t take advantage of such training either because according to the IAM’s report, only 47% of women actually feel safe on the roads.

The IAM says that more businesses should offer driver training and assessment to all their employees as best practice and a duty of care, since employers have a responsibility to take all reasonable steps to lower the risks to their employees when behind the wheel. After all, it is well documented that the most dangerous times for driving are in the morning and evening during rush hours periods and, therefore, those driving to work are at high risk of being involved in an accident.

So equal training for all, but are women actually better drivers? Some years ago a report from Bradford University claimed that the female hormone oestrogen improved spatial recognition memory, rule learning, attention planning and motor control. It said that women were more able to shift their attention from one stimulus to another, making it easier for them to perform tasks like driving. I’m not sure I fully concur with that one, though.

The report concluded that men are better at navigation, spatial awareness and confidence, but are involved in more accidents, whereas women are better at paying attention.

On the other hand, a study in 2008 by psychologists at Queen Mary College, London, found that women and gay men were most likely to be the worst drivers. Research showed that both performed poorly in tasks involving navigation and spatial awareness, compared to heterosexual men. The findings concluded that driving in a strange environment was more difficult for gay men and women as both rely on local landmarks to get around and were slower to take in spatial information.

So where does that leave us? Probably back where we started. Men think they are better because they can drive faster with more confidence and find their way around. They also crash more often, though. Women pay more attention, obey the rules, but are involved in more low-speed accidents. In other words, we drive differently, not better or worse than one another.