Traffic crashes are the leading cause of teen fatalities, accounting for 38% of all
teen deaths in the United States. Chances are, your community has been struck by a tragic accident involving a teenage friend, classmate or family member. The National Safety Council is trailblazing new ground to confront this crisis on a national level.
We’re on a mission to inform teens and their parents that they can beat the odds.
Join Us as we launch new strategies to:
Reducing risk
All new drivers can make wrong decisions behind the wheel; however teens are the
most at jeopardy. They bring to the road a unique mix of inexperience, distraction, peer pressure and a tendency to underestimate risk.
The National Safety Council pioneers research, symposiums and partnerships to identify and reduce the major risk factors teenage drivers face.
What you should know about:
Learn what you can do as a
parent
to curb these risks
Modifying risky behavior
Most Americans typically learn to drive during the teen years,
when the brain is not fully mature yet.
Recent research is beginning to give us insight why many teens have
difficulty regulating risk-taking behavior:
- The area of the brain that weighs consequences, suppresses impulses and
organizes thoughts does not fully mature until about age 25.
- Hormones are more active in teens, which influence the brain’s neurochemicals
that regulate excitability and mood. The result can be thrill-seeking behavior and
experiences that create intense feelings.
Learning to regulate driving behavior comes with time and practice.
Defensive Driving Course-Alive at 25® offers a balanced approach to help teens not
only regulate their own driving behavior, but also help them deal with the actual issues that can influence their driving behavior.
Developing Skills
Driver education programs play a role in preparing teens to drive, but should not be viewed as the end of the learning-to-drive process. In order to develop safe driving skills, inexperienced drivers need opportunities to improve through gradual exposure to increasingly-challenging driving tasks. Teens become safer drivers with more driving experience.
In some states, the completion of driver education qualifies a teen for full driving privileges. The National Safety Council believes this is not a wise approach. Research shows that significant hours of behind-the-wheel experience are necessary to reduce crash-involvement risk.
Parental involvement and state-imposed Graduated Driver Licensing play important roles in developing skills.