The not so As part of our psychology project we are tasked with observing the difference in driving behaviour between males and females. The test being who would skip the traffic lights when they change from amber to red.
Basically we have to stand at a set of traffic lights (preferably unseen to the drivers) for 10 minutes, jotting down who did and didn’t skip the lights when they changed.
So who is less likely to conform to traffic signals - Males or Females?
After asking the question it is normally followed by men saying “Males, because we are daring and everyone knows women don’t know how to drive!” This sparks off the women to say “Of course men will skip the lights they’re just dangerous and all think they are all boy racers!”
All-in-all the consensus says that men will skip the lights more often than women. So if I now tell you there is little to no difference in males and females who skip traffic lights would you be surprised?
I personally didn’t believe that women wouldn’t skip the lights anyway since I have shot through a few amber lights myself. But I did expect a higher percentage of men to women.
The final percentage from the class observations (thirty students) was:
69% of females stopped
63% of males stopped
31% of females didn’t stop
37% of males didn’t stop
So there you have it…our results, showing that women and men have little difference in their driving behaviour at traffic signals - well in this occasion at least.
7 Comments:
What you failed to mention was those 69% of females only stopped because it was an opportunity to adjust make-up and hair. The 63% of males that stopped only did so purely to scope out the women in the car who was doing her make-up and hair...
We didn't go into such detail thankfully.
Although women did tend to use this stop as an opportunity to rearrange their hair and wipe lipstick of their teeth.
I don't think the men stopped for the hair and make-up show though - It would have been for low cut tops...you males are very shallow like that :-)
No, we normally forget to stop when looking at low cut tops, and then crash into nearby lamposts.
And that's while you're walking! What would you be like if you were driving? :-D
Well when driving the dent in the lamp post is usually bigger, but the headache afterwards is smaller.
Suggest that your survey would come out differently if applied to different countries. I live in France and I guess a bigger percentage of males there would jump the lights.
I'm off to Paris this weekend ~ perhaps I should spend some time looking at the traffic rather than my companion.
Gorseinonboy
PS I've pinched some of your great widgets.
Love your title......and the book
Hi David
Thanks for your comments - always good to hear from people :-)
Yes that survey around the world would be intersting - Oddly enough our pilot study showed more males skipping lights, but when it came to the actaul study it was even...very odd? And a little disappointing being a female, we love nothing better than to mock men's driving :-)
No worries about taking some widgets - I'm still on the hunt for more to pad out my site.
Also I love the book and used it as a title for my blog because my husband is a sailor so is disappearing and appearing from our lives quite often - although he's not coming back any younger? Lol
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