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Published VersionCC BY-NC-ND V4.0, Open Access
Journal article
From anxiety to aggression: An investigation into the roles of antisocial traits and self-regulatory dysfunction in road behaviours
Transportation Research. Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour, Vol.113, pp.94-105
2025
Appears in UniSC Supported Open Access Outputs
Abstract
Research has shown that aggressive driving behaviours (ADBs) are often initiated via emotional impulses. However, little research to date has explored how feelings of anxiety may translate to aggression on the road. The primary aim of this study was to investigate the links between anxiety and ADB, and to explore the moderating influences that antisocial (psychopathic) traits, anger rumination, and emotion dysregulation hold toward this relationship. To achieve this, a sample of adult Australian drivers (N = 386; 61 % women; Mage = 50 years) completed an online survey battery. A MANOVA revealed that driving anxiety, anger rumination, emotion dysregulation, antisocial traits, and ADBs significantly differed between groups categorised by mild, moderate, and severe generalised anxiety; with higher scores largely being tied to more severe anxiety. Next, correlational analysis indicated that there were significant positive associations between anxiety (generalised and driving-related), anger rumination, antisocial traits, driving anger, and various aggressive driving behaviours. Finally, moderation analyses suggested that driving anxiety influenced ADBs in unique ways, depending on the context of participants’ anger rumination, emotion dysregulation, and antisocial traits. Specifically, conditional effects showed that where driving anxiety negatively predicted ADB after accounting for anger rumination at low levels, it was found to positively predict ADB when emotion dysregulation was high and antisocial traits were moderate or high. The findings of this study provide a greater understanding of how driving anxiety may manifest into aberrant and emotion-directed behaviours when driving on the road. Such findings could inform future road safety research and practice about the potential roles that self-regulatory factors play in understanding and intervening on ADB.
Details
- Title
- From anxiety to aggression: An investigation into the roles of antisocial traits and self-regulatory dysfunction in road behaviours
- Authors
- Steven Love (Corresponding Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Law and Society
- Publication details
- Transportation Research. Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour, Vol.113, pp.94-105
- Publisher
- Elsevier Ltd
- Date published
- 2025
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.trf.2025.04.020
- ISSN
- 1873-5517; 1369-8478
- Copyright note
- © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
- Data Availability
- The data that has been used is confidential.
- Grant note
- This study was funded by a grant between the Queensland Motor Accident Insurance Commission and the University of the Sunshine Coast.
- Organisation Unit
- Road Safety Research Collaboration; School of Law and Society
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 991127000802621
- Output Type
- Journal article
Metrics
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InCites Highlights
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- Web Of Science research areas
- Psychology, Applied
- Transportation
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