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news
Learner driver (image CC licensed by David J Morgan via Flickr).Driving instructors less likely to believe collisions “are usually the cyclist’s fault” and that cyclists are “nuisances” after cycle awareness course, new government pilot study finds
Driving instructors who took part in a government cycle awareness pilot scheme are less likely to believe that cyclists are “nuisances” on the road or often at fault for collisions – and more likely to teach learner drivers about cycle safety – the study’s findings have shown.
This week the government published an evaluation of its Approved Driver Instructor (ADI) Cycle Awareness Pilot project, which was funded under the Department for Transport’s Cycling and Walking Investment Straegy.
The pilot scheme, through the increased availability of practical training and online learning resources, aimed to “raise awareness” among driving instructors and learner drivers of why people cycle and how cyclists behave, and to improve new drivers’ interactions with cyclists.
In March 2020, survey organisation Ipsos UK was commissioned to support the Bikeability Trust with the design and implementation of a randomised control trial, which would evaluate the impact of a package of training materials on ADIs’ attitudes towards and awareness of cyclists and their behaviour.
The scheme involved a self-guided online learning course, developed by the Bikeability Trust and consisting of a mixture of videos, downloadable factsheets, interactive quizzes, and sample dialogues that can be shared with learner drivers.
The four modules, delivered sequentially, included ‘Sharing the road’, which focused on the benefits of active travel; ‘The law and the Highway Code’, which featured quizzes on infrastructure and cycling two abreast; ‘Training and National Standards’ for cycling and driving; and ‘Driving with cycle riders’, which focused on junctions, overtaking, and communication.
Between April 2021 and March 2022, driving instructors from areas with “high levels of cycling activity” – Bristol, Cambridge, Exeter, inner London, Manchester, Norwich, Oxford, and York – were recruited to the pilot scheme.
Participants were randomly allocated to a treatment group that was granted access to the learning materials, or a comparison group that was not granted access until the end of the pilot.
Both groups were asked to respond to two surveys at the beginning of the pilot and two to three months after its completion, covering attitudes towards cyclists, understanding of cyclists’ interactions with other road users, and their future intentions regarding both driving and driving instruction.
> The Highway Code for cyclists — all the rules you need to know for riding on the road explained
Despite only 15 per cent of the recruited driving instructors completing both the course and the final survey (which the survey’s analysts attributed to the timing of the pilot during Covid-19, and the increased workloads of instructors thereafter), of those who did, 60 per cent were very satisfied with the learning materials, with 74 per cent finding the advice on sharing the road with cyclists particularly useful.
Nearly all respondents felt they had benefitted in some way from participating in the course, such as how they teach their learner drivers and their level of understanding of cyclists’ behaviours, with 92 per cent saying they would recommend it to other instructors.
Examining the differences in attitudes towards cyclists between those who were subject to the learning materials and those who weren’t, there was a small reduction in the ADIs’ belief that cyclists are a nuisance to other road users (which dropped by 0.33 points), and that cyclists are usually at fault when collisions occur on the road (0.23) after they completed the scheme.
The belief that ‘motorists should always have right of way over cyclists when using public roads’ and that ‘there are too many cyclists’ was also slightly lower among those who finished the study.
They were also more likely to state that ‘most cyclists adhere to the rules’ and that ‘it should be compulsory for learner drivers to undertake a cycling awareness course before they can take their driving test’.
> Half of drivers think new practical test should include cyclist awareness
Meanwhile, analysis of the instructors’ perceptions of and behaviours towards cyclists showed a positive change in the immediate aftermath of the scheme, but these effects tended to fall over time, the study found.
There was also a self-reported intention from the majority of ADIs to change their teaching practices as a result of completing the course.
At the intervention stage, 89 per cent said they would teach students differently about how to deal with cyclists safely, and 82 per cent indicated their intention to increase the amount of teaching with each learner about cycle safety and incorporate more cycle awareness training into their lessons.
58 per cent also said they felt more confident teaching their students how to deal with people on bikes on the road, while 87 per cent believed the course will help them improve their teaching and make them a better driving instructor.
After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.
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31 comments
Which explains a lot. I reckon the standard of driving in the UK has noticeably decreased in the last 5-10 years. A host of factors no doubt, but I rarely hear anything about the standard of instruction ...
Ok, so now the trial has proven successful and useful it should be introduced on a compulsory basis for all driving instructors surely?
And let us not forget this instance a dismissive driving instructor following a close pass...
https://youtu.be/2Czhsj7foIM
Who has eyes in the back of their head?
It's pretty simple....watch where you are going.
Off topic, but I've just heard on the radio that someone is still allowed to drive with 176 points on their licence.
"Right to drive."
"Why should the children / elderly / disabled / employees (at drivers' business) be made to suffer - they didn't do anything?"
"The points system is petty - and arbitrary. Why should going over some random total mean sudden disproportionate punishment? That could be just a couple of occurrences of infringing minor rules. Things which everyone does - and most people will never see any sanction for! (And by the way some of those rules shouldn't even exist like some of those 'idiotic' speed limits)."
Did that explain it? I've heard / read stuff like that not infrequently.
I'm curious to know which motor insurers are accepting those drivers and what the premiums are.
And if some of those drivers aren't able to get insured (ie it is too expensive) with that many points but still cotinue to drive...
Reportedly a 26year old as well, so that's 18points per annum since they could have passed assuming none have lapsed...
Not only should he be banned but they should ban all the magistrates involved in the last 160 points.
I've just read that is someone with 217 points.
I have my doubts about the validity of the study, given the sample size etc. But given that I've had two very dodgy close passes recently by driving instructors, without a pupil in their car, I'm not at all surprised by the general narrative.
As an unrelated aside, whilst I'm sure most instructors are perfectly decent people, I've heard far too many horror stories about sleazy instructors for whom being in a car with a teenage girl is a highlight of the job. I await the driving instructor Me Too moment with some interest.
I've had 3 bad close passes from learners in as many weeks. Fine learners make mistakes but why isn't the instructor correcting them, teaching them how to drive properly?
When I caught one up and challenged the instructor about it, the guy was completely clueless about the highway code.
I had a scarily close pass from a learner recently, with oncoming traffic. When I threw an arm up to remonstrate, the instructor just waved at me out of the window. I sent the footage to the police and the school. Had an email from the instructor who insisted that his wave was meant to be an apology. Not convinced but even so I still don't know why he allowed the student to make the pass at all.
How can it possibly be that these attitudes exist in highly trained, informed, expert drivers? If, as it is implied, that most instructors think that cyclists have less rights than drivers, how the hell has that happened? Surely part of becoming an instructor is knowledge of the law? and if it isn't, why not?
This is terrifying. If the people charged with instructing others in how to behave on the road are teaching their pupils that cyclists are nuisances and usually at fault in collisions when the evidence is that it is much more likely that the driver is at fault, then the system for becoming a qualified instructor is not fit for purpose. This could be breeding a whole generation of drivers who think that cyclists have no right to be on the road, and drive accordingly.
Rather than do a pilot study, the authorities should be re-testing the instructors to ensure that they understand the law, others' rights on the road, and their responsibility for making sure that their pupils understand those subjects.
it seems that a lot, if not most, driving instructors teach that you only need to indicate in the presence of other motor vehicles; cyclists and pedestrians can just have a guess.
I have come to the conclusion that driving goes against the usual rule that practise makes perfect. It seems that the more you do it, past a certain point, the worse you get at it.
I remember my driving test examiner, straight after congratulating me for having passed the test said, "Don't be a twat and have that as your best ever days driving. You were good enough to pass, now go out, practice and GET BETTER." That last bit screamed at me as only a Sergeant Major knows how.
Quoting the "rule" in that way is inviting misunderstanding - "practice makes ... habit. Perfect practice makes perfect."
As opposed to the current and previous generations who... er... umm...
FTFY
"Expert drivers"?
One may make a small personal experiment of the sociological kind by asking a range of acquaintances to list the features defining "an expert driver". My own experiment, conducted many times with various types of folk, indicate that knowledge and application of the highway code is almost never part of their answer. They base their notion of "expert driver" more on a racing driver's antics than those approriate for a bog-standard wage slave safely auto-driving to & from the satanic mill or slopermarket.
As to "knowledge of the law" ..... the law and rule by it seems to have fallen into disfavour; a fall that seems likely to continue down the slippery slope to a generalised anarchy in the same way that it has in the MeSA, where law and justice are just something that rich people buy to browbeat their opponents; or some sort of brownshirt service to cow the hoi-polloi if they interfere with the profit-making or are of a shade that offends the richer's sense of aesthetics and tribal symbolism.
Cars and the mad driving of them have long been a harbinger, a signal, a portend of an inherent presence in our thin-skinned civilisations of the churning human monsterism always waiting to pop up and run amok. Driving instructors will not be immune and may even be a vector for an increased motoring monsterism, as they reflect to zeitgeist of wider society. "You must own the road".
Civilisations are rarely murdered but rather die by suicide.
For most people, I don't think it even requires that much 'mastery'. If you've managed to keep doing it (however badly) for more than about 5 years, then that makes you an 'expert'.
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it." Upton Sinclair
Perhaps they can get taxi drivers to take the course too.
Did any of them say they would drive *better*?
Everyday that I go out on my bike, there's always some smart ass who decides to pass too close at speed. All it needs is a small right down pull of the steering wheel to give me more room when passing. But they don't because they think I shouldn't be there.
stiffer penalties needed for aggressive and dangerous drivers.
I agree. I would rather that punishment for close passes was more enforced and harsher, than have a shared path installed along my commute. I don't need or want to cycle on a pavement at 10mph for a 20 mile each way commute, having to cross more than 100 side roads and trying to avoid pedestrians, loose dogs, and kids on bikes popping wheelies.
The epitome of junk pseudo-science, and the findings mean nothing. In practice, they know what they're supposed to say after completing the junk course, but I doubt it this translates to better attitudes and behaviour around cyclists
You are too generous. Just 15 per cent completed the course, destroying the randomized design. The conclusion would be something like 'The small portion of driving instructors self selecting to complete the survey on average admitted that they were originally ignorant of the subject they claimed to teach and that they would do better in future '
It's kind of worrying that driving instructors who operate in areas with high levels of cycling activity, who are teaching other people to drive in those areas, still have to be taught this stuff... 🙄
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