Assessing How Private Beliefs Conflict with Public Action on Safe Systems

R38: Assessing How Private Beliefs Conflict with Public Action on Safe Systems

Research Team

Principal Investigator:
Seth LaJeunesse, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Co-Principal Investigator: 
Jill Cooper, University of California, Berkeley

Funding Organization

Collaborative Sciences Center for Road Safety (CSCRS)


Summary

This project aims to assess the degree of pluralistic ignorance in people’s minds about what others prioritize in transportation, with safety being among the priorities. This project will also analyze participants’ ranked transportation investment priorities and assess how pluralistic ignorance of others’ priorities predicts less desirable travel attitudes and behaviors (e.g., failing to yield to pedestrians in marked crosswalks, driving well above the posted speed limit), as well as participants’ transportation aspirations (e.g., to walk more and drive less); investigate the mismatch among survey participants’ ranked priorities and their local and state policymakers’ transportation-related voting patterns and budgeting decisions; and discern the degree to which pluralistic ignorance helps to explain prevailing patterns in transportation funding and programming; and facilitate other Universities’ and local agencies’ assessment of the population’s transportation investment priorities.


Learn more about this project on the CSCRS website.