Attitudinal segmentaion of drivers in Pakistan: The potential for effective road safety campaigns

Deviant driving behaviors are considered as the main cause of Road Traffic Accidents in Pakistan. This research is founded on the premise that driving behaviors are mediated by attitudinal and motivational factors. It advocates that rather than simply aggregating drivers’ responses or a-priori classification of them based on their personal characteristics, adoption of segmentation technique is more useful to look at multiple factors provoking aberrant driving behavior in combination and not just in isolation. For this, the study generated an Attitudinal Questionnaire, inspired by the Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB: Ajzen, 1991), and extended violation-scale of modified Driver Behavior Questionnaire (DBQ: Lawton et al., 1997). Attitudinal and behavioral items are first factor analyzed. Then, cluster analysis is performed on extracted attitudinal factors which classified sample driving population into four relatively homogenous and distinct groups of drivers. The results demonstrated the explanatory utility of the market segmentation approach to systematically relate the interaction between attitudes, behaviors and socio-demographic characteristics of drivers. It is concluded that the approach is successful in distinguishing safe drivers from unsafe driver and therefore, can legitimately form the basis of road safety interventions. Finally, the findings are used to recommend targeted information-based road safety solutions with a focus on the diverse characteristics of each of the identified segments

VITALISE - Visualising actIve TrAveL wIth pakiStani familiEs in Bradford

Millions more journeys need to be walked or cycled (active travel) to meet the UK's Net Zero emissions target by 2050. However, across the UK, we do not yet walk and cycle enough short trips to make a difference. There are several reasons including many people find it difficult to get out of the habit of using a car for every journey, there are not enough safe routes for people to use for walking or cycling and lower participation within some communities. This document reports on a Photovoice (PV) based Participatory Action Research study designed to investigate barriers to active travel in Bradford’s Pakistani heritage community. It also aimed to investigate the use of PV to encourage critical consciousness of active travel (AT)

Visualising active travel with Pakistani heritage families in Bradford, UK – Photovoice as a tool for change

In this paper we report insights on barriers to active travel among the Pakistani heritage community in Bradford UK, generated using the participatory Photovoice method. This is the largest minoritized ethnic group in Bradford, and though most segments of the UK population need to be more physically active, those of non-white ethnicities, and South Asian heritage in particular, are generally significantly less active than average. Insufficient physical activity (including active travel) contributes to a significant health burden for minoritized communities as well limiting progress with increasing active travel among these communities. Increasing active travel is known to contribute to both positive health outcomes and to key transport decarbonisation aims. To meet public health goals and Net Zero emissions targets by 2050, increasing walking and cycling for short journeys will be essential but it remains difficult to achieve. There is a lack of knowledge relating to how specific cultural groups perceive active travel as an option within their local areas. We sought to explore the use of Photovoice to understand whether this method has potential to enable minoritized communities to actively consider active travel, and to provide connections between these communities and their local authorities. We recruited eight Pakistani heritage families living in Bradford to do this. Their photos were used in semi-structured interviews, and the data collectively analysed. The analysis suggested key barriers to walking and cycling could be grouped into four main categories: personal factors, social factors and those related to the local and wider environment. We also found that people's travel choices in this study are influenced by cognitive biases and social norms that are quite connected to their cultural heritage and societal position as minoritized. There were also both generational and gendered effects that need to be accounted for in intervention design. Based on participants' reflection and feedback, this report concludes participatory techniques like Photovoice offer an opportunity to break the status quo for those who are struggling to make a change by raising their social consciousness and helping them to gather evidence of their concerns

Transition from localized to mean field behaviour of cascading failures in the fiber bundle model on complex networks

We study the failure process of fiber bundles on complex networks focusing on the effect of the degree of disorder of fibers' strength on the transition from localized to mean field behaviour. Starting from a regular square lattice we apply the Watts-Strogatz rewiring technique to introduce long range random connections in the load transmission network and analyze how the ultimate strength of the bundle and the statistics of the size of failure cascades change when the rewiring probability is gradually increased. Our calculations revealed that the degree of strength disorder of nodes of the network has a substantial effect on the localized to mean field transition. In particular, we show that the transition sets on at a finite value of the rewiring probability, which shifts to higher values as the degree of disorder is reduced. The transition is limited to a well defined range of disorder, so that there exists a threshold disorder of nodes' strength below which the randomization of the network structure does not provide any improvement neither of the overall load bearing capacity nor of the cascade tolerance of the system. At low strength disorder the fully random network is the most stable one, while at high disorder best cascade tolerance is obtained at a lower structural randomness. Based on the interplay of the network structure and strength disorder we construct an analytical argument which provides a reasonable description of the numerical findings.Comment: 30 pages, 11 figure

Does Emotionality and Private self-consciousness influence drivers’ cognitive appraisal in anger-provoking situations?—An explorative study in Chinese drivers

In recent decades, most studies have investigated the role of drivers’ demographic background, dispositional traits, and cognitive appraisal in driving anger in an independent manner. However, it is possible that driver’s dispositions and their cognitive appraisal could impact driving anger concurrently. The present study aims to investigate how the individual’s characteristics (e.g., age, gender, and dispositions) influence state driving anger when considering the role of cognitive appraisal undertaken in anger-provoking situations. 17 anger-provoking scenarios using the Measure for Angry Drivers (MAD) were employed to probe the cognitive appraisal of Chinese drivers. The participants completed the Private self-consciousness scale (Prsc), the Brief HEXACO Inventory, and questions related to cognitive appraisal and state driving anger. Several ANCOVAs were performed to evaluate age and gender differences in state driving anger, Emotionality and Prsc. Results indicated that younger drivers reported higher state driving anger and Emotionality. While males and females exhibited similar levels of state driving anger, they significantly differed in Emotionality, instead of the Prsc. Moreover, a Partial Least Squared Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) found that age showed no direct impact on cognitive appraisal, but gender did. Importantly, Emotionality was found to be directly and positively related to state driving anger rather than the cognitive appraisal, while Prsc was indirectly associated with state driving anger if considering the driver’s cognitive appraisal. The study provided the theoretical basis and insights to develop targeted driving anger countermeasures in China

Auger recombination suppression and band alignment in GaAsBi/GaAs heterostructures

Using a combination of experimental and theoretical techniques we present the dependence of the bandgap Eg and the spin orbit splitting energy so, with Bi concentration in GaAsBi/GaAs samples. We find that the concentration at which so,> Eg occurs at 9%. Both spectroscopic as well as first device results indicate a type I alignment

Motorcycle three-wheelers in Pakistan: Low-cost rural transport services, crucial for women’s mobility

Rural women and men without their own means of transport depend on transport services. In low- and middle-income countries these are mainly provided by informal sector entrepreneurs. In Pakistan, motorcycle three-wheelers (designed as six-seater, route-based vehicles) provide most rural transport services. Research was undertaken in three districts of Punjab Province, with traffic counts and surveys of transport users. Motorcycles are increasing rapidly, and men’s use of transport services is declining. The traffic counts showed motorcycles for personal and family use carry almost half of the people travelling. Women are increasingly passengers on motorcycles driven by male relatives, but these are seldom available for women’s multipurpose trips during the daytime. On village-to-town roads, motorcycle three-wheelers are the only low-cost (two cents USD per passenger-km) public transport throughout the day. Point-to-point taxis are more costly. Most (55%) of women’s public transport journeys are in three-wheelers. Women and men rate motorcycle three-wheelers highly, particularly their fares and frequency. Women have a greater willingness to pay more for less crowded, safer vehicles than men. It is concluded that the informal sector motorcycle three-wheeler services are optimising village-to-town transport connections, providing the only low-cost travel option for many rural women. Policies should avoid disrupting their vital services. With motorcycle growth undermining transport services, gender-aware strategies should be developed to facilitate frequent, uncrowded three-wheeler operations

Willingness to pay for COVID-19 mitigation measures in public transport and paratransit in low-income countries

In order to combat the spread of COVID-19, various measures were taken in most countries to make public transit and paratransit safer. These additional measures, which include restrictions on number of passengers, provision of hand sanitisers and face coverings, and more frequent cleaning, add to the costs of operations or reduce profitability. The resulting financial pressure on the transport operators raises an important question on who pays for these additional measures. In most countries, this has been covered by one-time government bailouts to operators or strategies to increase fare, the latter of which directly affects the users. However, even without these interventions, there could be a demand and as such willingness to pay (WTP) for some of these intervention measures from the consumers concerned about safety. Knowing such WTP will not only help operators set their fare, but also help the governments decide the appropriate bailout needed. This paper addresses the issue by estimating the user's willingness to pay for selected COVID-19 mitigation measures in public transport and paratransit (motorcycle taxis) using survey data collected from two cities in low-income countries as case studies – Kampala, Uganda and Dhaka, Bangladesh. For public transport, these measures are - (1) social distancing (passenger loading at half capacity), and (2) mandatory hand sanitisation and increased cleaning of surfaces, while for paratransit, they are - (1) provision of a transparent shield between the rider and the passenger, and (2) provision of cleaned helmets at the start of each trip. The study analyses stated preference data using the utility maximisation framework and finds that the implementation or provision of COVID-19 mitigation measures improves the attractiveness of the associated public transport or paratransit alternatives, and transport users make trade-offs between safety and cost when making travel decisions. We find positive willingness to pay for all four mitigation measures, suggesting potential existence of a market for these measures. We also find that the typical mode choice factors such as costs, travel time and convenience became less important during the pandemic and the safety measures became more important considerations