Accident Analysis and Prevention 34 (2002) 43–50

Stop, look, listen, and think?What young children really do when crossing the road

M. Suzanne Zeedyk a,*, Linda Wallace b, Linsay Spry a

a Department of Psychology, Uni�ersity of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, UKb Tayside Police, Police Headquarters, West Bell Street, Dundee DD1 9JU, UK

Received 10 February 2000; received in revised form 15 August 2000; accepted 13 September 2000

Abstract

This study sought to provide basic information about children’s behaviour in realistic traffic situations. Most literature in thisarea has focused on children’s knowledge about road safety or has assessed their behaviour in simulated traffic environments.However, until more is known about what children actually do in traffic environments, our ability to identify the importantelements for inclusion in educational programmes remains limited. Fifty-six children, aged 5–6 years, took part in a ‘treasure trail’activity in which they were confronted with two road crossings, one at a T-junction with a moving car and the other betweenparked cars. Children’s performance was videotaped and coded for relevant behaviours such as stopping at the kerb, looking fortraffic, direction of gaze, and style of crossing (i.e. walking vs. running). Results revealed that performance was extremely poor.Sixty percent of the children failed to stop before proceeding from the kerb onto the road. Looking for oncoming traffic wasexhibited by no more than 41% of the sample, dropping to as low as 7% in some instances. When looking did occur, it wasinitially as likely to be in the inappropriate direction (i.e. to the left) as in the appropriate direction (i.e. to the right).Consideration of individual performance revealed the existence of individual differences within the sample; such differences wererelatively stable across the two road crossings. These findings, based on controlled naturalistic tasks and detailed observationalmethods, build on earlier studies that are generally able to provide only estimated rates of children’s behaviour. © 2001 ElsevierScience Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Children’s behaviour; Realistic traffic situations; Controlled naturalistic tasks; Detailed observational methods

www.elsevier.com/locate/aap

1. Introduction

Concern for children’s safety as pedestrians has beenapparent within the UK for at least 25 years. Pedestrianaccidents are still widely regarded as one of the mostserious of all health risks facing children in developedcountries (Thomson et al., 1996), with Britain leadingEurope in the rate of child pedestrian fatalities (IR-TAD, 1995). Numerous educational initiatives at thenational level, such as the Green Cross Code, the TuftyClub, and the Children’s Traffic Club, as well as at thelocal level (e.g. Footsteps programme, 1996; Walkwiseprogramme, Davies et al., 1993), have attempted toaddress the issue by teaching children skills for dealing

with the traffic environment. The Department of theEnvironment, Transport and the Regions recentlyfunded research programmes designed to obtain a bet-ter understanding of children’s pedestrian skills and todevelop new educational initiatives on that basis (De-partment of Transport et al., 1996). All of these pro-grammes, regardless of whether or not they eventuallyproved to be effective, are commendable in that theyhave taken the issue of road safety seriously.

However, such programmes continue to ignore abasic observation made 20 years ago by Grayson: ‘oneshould know how children do behave before tellingthem how they should behave’ (Grayson, 1981, p. 172,italics added). We may know a bit more today than weonce did about how children deploy their attention,about the ways in which their physiological develop-ment limits their ability to cope with traffic, and aboutthe separate ‘component skills’ that comprise the

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +44-1382-344611; fax: +44-1382-229993.

E-mail address: m.s.zeedyk@dundee.ac.uk (M.S. Zeedyk).

0001-4575/01/$ - see front matter © 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.PII: S 0 0 0 1 -4575 (00 )00101 -9

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–5044

‘pedestrian task’ (Thomson et al., 1996: 4). Ironically,though we still know very little about the basic questionof what children actually do on roads. What aspects ofthe traffic environment do they pay attention to? Howgood are they at integrating various pieces of informa-tion? Under what circumstances are they distracted?Thomson and his colleagues recently reinforcedGrayson’s earlier comments, when they observed that‘only if we have a clear idea of what children actuallydo look out for in the traffic environment will we be ina position to improve their attention to those featureswhich they ought to focus on to render them safe roadusers’ (Foot et al., 1999, p.400, italics in original). Thus,the purpose of the present study was to address this gapin the literature by gathering basic information aboutwhat children actually do on the road, through detailedobservation of their behaviour in two realistic road-crossing situations.

Behavioural assessment, particularly in realistic situa-tions, is notoriously difficult. The risk of placing chil-dren in real traffic situations is high. Little supportwould be gained for implementing the questionablekind of programme described by Downing (1981: 99),in which Scandinavian parents were encouraged totrain children by hiding a toy across the road and thento ‘stop their child’ once they had ‘start(ed) to run intoand across the road’. Instead, simulated environmentsand techniques have gained popularity, such as thepretend road (Lee et al., 1984; Young and Lee, 1987),kerbside judgements (Demetre et al., 1993), and trafficgardens (Sandels, 1975). Unfortunately, employing suchtechniques makes the issue of road safety salient forchildren, perhaps encouraging them to demonstratetheir ‘best practice’ rather than more typical behaviour.The dimensions, timescales, and other characteristics ofthe tasks also often do not reflect those of real situa-tions accurately; indeed, children involved in such tasksmay even draw inaccurate or detrimental conclusionsabout the complexity of crossing the road.

There have been some studies that observed childrenin real-life environments and coded their actions on-line, including the research conducted by the ScottishDevelopment Department (1989) which observed 10 000children within a region of Scotland. Other studies havevideotaped children’s actions inconspicuously (e.g.Schioldborg, 1976; Valavuo, 1976; Molen, 1983; allcited in Thomson et al., 1996). Although these methodsare superior to simulations in helping us to know whatchildren do in naturalistic settings, one drawback isthat on-line coding can be done only once and cannotbe subsequently verified. The vantagepoint of the ob-server in naturalistic settings may also obscure many ofthe child’s behaviours, particularly in regard to lookingfor traffic. Relevant characteristics, such as age, culturalbackground and experience with traffic can at best onlybe estimated, the absence of which is important because

a range of individual differences has been shown toexist among children (e.g. Whitebread and Neilson,1999). In effect, researchers ‘take what they can get’ inthe way of data, but the sampling technique can beincomplete.

The present study was designed to try to overcomesome of these problems and to provide detailed infor-mation about children’s abilities by inconspicuouslyfilming the children’s behaviour when they were con-fronted with realistic traffic situations. Children wereengaged in an outdoor ‘treasure trail’, the route ofwhich presented them with two different types of roadcrossings. The traffic environment they faced was thesame as they would encounter in their daily lives;junctions, parked cars, and moving traffic. The environ-ment was, in reality, a safe one, for traffic flow wasbeing regulated by police officers out of sight of thechildren. Because the children were not aware of theseprecautions, their behaviour allowed us to monitortheir actions in what was, for them, a very real trafficenvironment.

The context within which the assessment was con-ducted contained several features that were intended toreplicate circumstances common to child pedestrianaccidents. For example, the most frequent activity pre-ceding traffic accidents involving young children is play(Grayson, 1975; Sandels, 1975; Christie, 1995), withchildren running into the road without looking fortraffic, generally because their attention is focused onsomething else (Scottish Development Department,1989). By embedding the road crossings within anotheractivity (i.e. the treasure trail), we created the equiva-lent of such circumstances. The fact that the activitiesoccurred in the presence of adults (i.e. school andresearch staff) also recreated the circumstances com-mon to between one-third and one-half of child pedes-trian accidents, which occur when children are in thepresence of adults (Grayson, 1975; Sandels, 1975;Christie, 1995). Finally, although children were facedwith a road crossing, they could choose to cross ontheir own or to seek adult assistance. Thus, the activityis equally as applicable to children who have alreadygained autonomous experience of roads, because theirparents allow them such independence, as to childrenwho have gained only supervised experience of roads.All children today will be familiar with traffic situationssuch as arriving at school with their parents, unloadinggroceries from the car with their parents, or catchingsight of a friend standing across the street. They mustmake decisions about how to cope with these types ofsituations—assume adults are monitoring the situationand proceed without confirming that this is the case?Wait until an adult arrives to help with crossing? Checkoncoming traffic themselves? The primary school chil-dren assessed in this study would have to make similardecisions about how to cope with the traffic situationsin which they found themselves here.

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–50 45

The children were in Primary II at the time the studywas conducted (5–6 years of age). This age group waschosen because contemporary researchers continue torecommend that children receive road safety training inthe early school years (e.g. Whitebread and Neilson,1999), and many educational initiatives continue tofocus on this age group (e.g. Rothengatter, 1981;Thomson et al., 1992; Ampofo-Boateng et al., 1993).Thus, if our aim was to gather basic data about chil-dren’s behaviour, it seemed most useful to concentrateon an age group that is receiving considerable attentionfrom road safety researchers and educators. Detailedinformation about the degree to which young childrendo (and do not) spontaneously employ key road safetyskills in realistic settings, such as stopping at the kerb,looking both ways for traffic, and noticing movingvehicles, is necessary if road safety initiatives are to beappropriate and effective.

2. Method

2.1. Participants

Participants were 56 children, 31 boys and 25 girls,all of whom were Primary II pupils at an inner-cityprimary school in Dundee, Scotland. As such, theywere within the age range of 5–6 years. Parents hadconsented to their children’s participation in the study.In their earlier year of schooling (Primary I), the chil-dren had been involved in some exploratory classroom-based road safety activities, a fuller description ofwhich can be found in Zeedyk et al. (2000).

2.2. Beha�ioural assessment

The site selected for the behavioural assessment waslocated in a local technology park, where it was easy toregulate traffic flow. Police officers, stationed out ofsight of the children, stopped traffic while each childwas executing his/her two road crossings (describedbelow), and traffic was only allowed to flow betweenindividual children’s turns. The site, therefore, appearedto children to be a standard traffic environment, with arelatively small amount of traffic flow but with all thehazards of any residential street.

The road crossings on which children were assessedwere components of a ‘treasure trail’. The eight lettersof the word ‘treasure’ had been posted individually ontrees, lamp posts, and street furniture in the area, andchildren had to find and collect these letters in thecorrect order. The trail was easy for the children tofollow, with the letter-signs placed in prominent loca-tions such that children could easily spot each subse-quent letter. An adult was situated near each site incase children needed any assistance. Collection of the

entire set of letters required children to confront tworoad crossings. The crossings were unobtrusivelyvideotaped and children’s behaviours later coded. Thefact that children were crossing a road was neverexplicitly pointed out to them; neither were they explic-itly encouraged or discouraged to cross the road. Inshort, they were faced with a traffic situation whilst inthe midst of carrying out another activity, which, asnoted earlier, is a circumstance they will face almostdaily. Children did not have to cross the road on theirown. Staff were always nearby to assist if children sorequested. In case children assumed the environmentwas safe simply because they were on a school outing,staff adopted a posture that made it obvious they werenot monitoring the traffic environment (e.g. by tyingtheir shoelaces or appearing to read paperwork).

The road layout within which the road crossings tookplace is depicted in Fig. 1. The first crossing involved aT-junction, occurring between the points marked A andB in the figure. Children stood facing the main road, 18feet in width, with a slip road leading to a parking lot,16 feet in width, to their right. A moving car situatedon the slip road, driven by a police officer, approachedthe main road. The blinking indicator indicated that thecar was going to turn right (i.e. away from the child).After 15 s (or less, if the child failed to wait for the car),the car turned right and drove away. The kerb on thefar side of the road to which the children needed tocross (in order to collect the next letter in the series)was clear and visible to the child.

Having completed the first road crossing (either withor without adult assistance) and collected two moreletters, the child encountered the second road crossing.Occurring approximately between the points marked Cand D in Fig. 1, this crossing situation required thatthey make a decision about crossing between twoparked cars. There was, two car-lengths down the road,a large open space at which no cars were parked, which

Fig. 1. Schematic depiction of the road layout incorporating the twoassessed road crossings.

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–5046

was a more suitable place to cross (according to exist-ing UK guidelines). Children could thus have moved tothis area in order to carry out their crossing, but in theend, none of them did so.

The completion of the second road crossing broughtchildren to the final letter to be collected on the trea-sure trail. Having selected a prize from the treasurebox, a member of staff spoke to each child, asking ifthey had realised they were crossing a road and point-ing out what they had done well and/or what theycould have improved on. In particular, if they hadcrossed on their own, it was stressed that it would havebeen better to ask an adult for help. This exchangeensured that the activity had not suggested to the childthat their behaviour, if executed poorly and/or on theirown, was acceptable.

2.3. Procedure

Behavioural assessments were carried out over thecourse of 2 days. Approximately half the children wereassessed on the first day and half the children on thesecond. On each day, participating children were trans-ported by bus to the chosen site, where a variety ofactivities had been arranged for them (e.g. story time,art, games). Thus, the treasure trail would have beenperceived as only one of several activities in which theytook part that morning. The entire outing lasted forapproximately 3 h, and children were returned by busto the school in time for lunch. Management of theouting was labour intensive, with approximately 20adults (staff plus police officers) required to supervisethe various activities. Staff associated with the treasuretrail were very familiar to the children, in the hope thatthis might increase the likelihood that children wouldrequest assistance in crossing the street. Each childcrossed the road individually and out of sight of theother children. The two crossings were performed oneafter the other (with several letters having been col-lected in between), and the next child did not take theirturn until the earlier child had completed both ofhis/her crossings and waiting traffic had been allowedto flow. Completion of the two crossings was accom-plished in approximately 4 min. Children’s behaviourthroughout the task was videotaped inconspicuously,using a Sony UVW l00P Pro-Betacam SP Camcorder,which has zoom facilities powerful enough to capturebehaviours as subtle as eye movements. It did notappear that any child noticed the camera or cameraperson. The videotape of each child was later coded forbehaviours as described below.

2.4. Coding

Videotapes of children performing the road crossingswere coded for specific behaviours relevant to each type

of crossing. For the first crossing, involving the T-junc-tion and moving car, we recorded whether or notchildren (1) looked for traffic on the main road beforereaching kerb; (2) stopped at the kerb; (3) looked fortraffic while stopped at kerb; (4) looked at the movingcar to their right; (5) waited for the car to move offbefore crossing; (6) continued to look for traffic whilecrossing; and (7) the style in which the children crossed(i.e. walking vs. running or skipping). For the secondcrossing, between parked cars, we recorded whether ornot children (1) looked for traffic before reaching thekerb; (2) stopped at the kerb; (3) stopped at the edge ofthe parked cars; (4) looked for traffic while stopped atthe edge of the cars; (5) continued to look for trafficwhile crossing; and (6) the style in which the childrencrossed. In cases where the child looked for traffic, wealso recorded the number of looks that each childexhibited and the direction of each look. If a childrequested help from an adult, this was recorded (butnote the child would not then have needed to exhibitthe behaviours in which we were interested, so thesecould not be coded). The coded behaviours, as listedabove, constitute the primary components of the taskof road crossing, including those which educationalprogrammes emphasise and which parents commonlyremind young children to carry out (e.g.‘look bothways before crossing the road’; ‘always walk, neverrun’; ‘never cross the road without an adult’). Analysisof children’s performance in the detailed manner under-taken here allows us to determine how well they carryout each of the behaviours when acting spontaneously.

Coding was carried out by two trained researchassistants. Videos of the entire sample were codedindependently by both assistants. A total of 748 deci-sions were made for the sample as a whole; coders werein agreement in regard to 93% of those decisions. Forthe remaining 7% of cases, in which there were dis-agreements, decisions were made on the basis of consul-tation between the coders and the first author.

3. Results

Analysis of the results proceeded in two stages. Thefirst considered group performance, using a descriptiveanalysis to determine the proportion of the sample thathad exhibited each of the behaviours coded. The secondstage looked at individual differences in performanceby calculating a score for each child, thereby allowingus to make comparisons within the sample and examinethe stability of children’s performance.

The data emerging from the first stage of analysis areshown in Tables 1 and 2. On the first crossing, theT-junction, ten of the 56 children (18%) requested helpfrom an adult. This is encouraging, showing that atleast a small proportion of children recognised they

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–50 47

Table 1Pattern of behaviours exhibited by children crossing alone at crossing 1: T-junction with a moving car (N=46)

Number children Direction of gaze Conversion to percentof sample (N=46)exhibiting behaviour (for items pertaining

to looking)

Right Left

51 Looked right and/or left before reaching kerb 11%0 5First look2Second look 0

Third look 0 019Stopped at kerb2 41%33 Looked right and/or left while stopped at kerb 7%

1First look 22 0Second look0Third look 1

274 Looked at moving car 59%7Waited for car to move off before crossing5 15%

Looked right and/or left while crossing6 7 15%2First look 5

Second look 3 0Third look 0 0Style of crossing7Walking 12 26%

34 74%Running/skipping

were in a traffic situation and sought assistance to dealwith the associated risk. Of the remaining 46 childrenwho chose to cross on their own, performance wasgenerally poor, as demonstrated in Table 1. For exam-ple, 40% of the children never even looked at themoving car; 60% failed to stop at the kerb beforeproceeding on to the road; 75% ran or skipped whilstcompleting the crossing. Perhaps most striking is thechildren’s poor performance in looking for oncomingtraffic. In every instance where children could havebeen expected to look for traffic on the main road (i.e.before reaching kerb, while stopped at kerb, in themidst of crossing the road), no more than 15% of thesample (i.e. seven children) did so. Moreover, the direc-tion of their gaze was generally inappropriate. Children(who looked) almost always looked to the left first,despite the fact that cars approaching from the rightwould present the immediate danger, as children wouldbe stepping from the kerb into the path of those cars.The serious nature of this restricted gaze pattern ishighlighted by the finding that looking was usuallylimited to a single observation; only three children everlooked a second time. In short, on the first crossing, themajority of the children failed to exhibit any of thestandard road safety procedures children are typicallytaught: they did not stop at the kerb, they did not lookfor traffic, and they ran while crossing the road.

Group performance on the second crossing, betweenparked cars, was somewhat better, although this time,only five of the 56 children (9%) requested help from an

adult in crossing. Indeed, one of the children an-nounced, ‘this time I’ll show you I can do it by myself,’suggesting that some children may see crossing on theirown as an achievement, rather than as dangerous ordisobedient. Of the 51 children, who crossed on theirown, 35% stopped at the edge of the cars and just under50% walked, rather than ran, while completing thecrossing. The pattern of looking behaviour also im-proved, with between 30% and 40% of the childrenlooking (at least once) at any of the three points, wherethey would be expected to check for traffic (e.g. beforereaching the kerb, while stopped at the edge of the cars,while carrying out the crossing). A larger proportion offirst looks was also in the appropriate direction (i.e. tothe right rather than the left), although the proportionof children exhibiting a second or third look remainedrelatively small.

For the second stage of analysis, which consideredindividual performance, scores were calculated for eachchild. Each child was scored on their performance inthe first crossing and in the second crossing. For eachspecific behaviour coded in the videotapes (and detailedin Tables 1 and 2), one point was awarded if thebehaviour was executed correctly and zero points if itwas not. Since the two types of crossings requireddifferent behaviours, the highest possible total score forthe first crossing was 7 and 6 for the second crossing.Thus, the higher the score, the better the child’s perfor-mance. If children asked for assistance on a crossing,they were assigned the highest possible score for that

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–5048

crossing, given that requesting help would be regardedas optimum performance.

Of those children who chose to cross alone, the meanscore for the first crossing was 1.74 (S.D.=1.53; range0–7; mode=0), and the mean score for the secondcrossing 1.94 (S.D.=1.48; range 0–6; mode=2). Thisreveals that individual performance was generally poor.On average, children failed to carry out even twobehaviours correctly. There were some high scoresachieved within the sample, but in no case were all thebehaviours executed correctly (i.e. no child who crossedalone achieved the maximum score possible).

In order to explore the consistency of children’sperformance, children’s scores on the first and secondcrossings were correlated using a Pearson’s coefficientcalculation. Results indicated that the relationship be-tween the two scores was significant, r(54)=0.66, P�001. Children who had performed well on the firstcrossing also tended to perform well on the secondcrossing, and similarly for those who performed poorly.It would appear that children’s performance was fairlystable across the two situations, suggesting that individ-ual differences may exist in children’s road-crossingabilities, even at this young age.

4. Discussion

The results of this study make clear that Primary IIchildren are exceedingly poor at crossing roads safely.On both crossing situations assessed here, 60% or moreof the children failed to stop before proceeding from

the kerb on to the road. Looking for oncoming trafficwas absent in at least 60% of the sample. It dropped toas low as 93% in some instances. When looking didoccur, it was frequently restricted to a single observa-tion, which was equally as likely to be in the inappro-priate direction (i.e. to the left) as in the appropriatedirection (i.e. to the right). Even if children took noteof the moving car on the slip road, as did more thanhalf the children, they did not necessarily wait for it tomove away from them; 85% crossed before it hadmoved off. Between one-half and three-quarters of thesample ran or skipped cheerfully across the street.

These findings accord with figures published in otherresearch. In regard to looking behaviour, researchershave estimated that between 40 and 50% of the samplesof young children they were working with failed to lookbefore stepping out into traffic (Grayson, 1975; Molen,1981; Scottish Development Department, 1989). Esti-mates rose even higher for the rate of partial looking(i.e. to only one direction). However, these reportedfigures are based predominantly upon estimates ob-tained during interviews or on-line observations. Thefigures reported in this study are based on structuredobservations that allowed for replicable coding. Infor-mation about the appropriateness of the direction inwhich the child looked, at several different pointswithin the road-crossing task, also elaborates on earlierfindings. Moreover, these data gathered in a naturalisticsetting are able to support findings obtained with labo-ratory techniques that show young children’s visualsearch tends to be inadequate and unfocused (e.g. Footet al., 1999).

Table 2Pattern of behaviours exhibited by children crossing alone at crossing 2: between parked cars (N=51)

Number children Conversion to percentDirection of gaze(for items pertainingexhibiting behaviour of sample (N=51)to looking)

Right Left

Looked right and/or left before reaching kerb 151 29%First look 13 2

1Second look 1Third look 0 0

2 Stopped at kerb (direction of gaze could not be coded) 8%43 Stopped at edge of cars 35%18

33%4 17Looked right and/or left while stopped at edge of cars12 5First look

Second look 6 812Third look

Looked right and/or left while crossing 215 41%First look 11 10Second look 6 2Third look 0 2

6 Style of crossingWalking 24 47%Running/skipping 27 53%

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–50 49

Studies have also provided estimates about the pro-portion of accidents that occur as a result of childrendashing out into traffic. Linden et al. (1975, cited inThomson et al., 1996) estimated that 70% of childpedestrian accidents in Holland occurred because chil-dren failed to stop at the kerb, Sandels (1975) estimatedthis was the cause in 50% of Swedish accidents. Ourfindings that at least 60% of this sample failed to stopbefore proceeding on to the road provide good evidencefor these projections. Dashing into the street is gener-ally linked with distractibility. Anecdotes and interviewdata often report that children fail to stop because theirattention is focused on another event (e.g. a friendappearing across the street), rather than on aspects ofthe traffic environment. Many of the children in thissample exhibited such behaviour. They appeared to beso focused on finding the next letter on the treasuretrail that they were oblivious to the fact they were evencrossing a road.

Consideration of individual performance within thesample revealed the extent of individual differences.While individual performance was generally poor, therewere some children who exhibited better skills thanothers, and such individual differences were relativelystable across the two crossings (r=0.66). If children didwell when crossing at the T-junction, they also tendedto do well when crossing between parked cars. White-bread and Neilson (1999) measuring a variety of abili-ties using laboratory tasks, also found considerableindividual differences in children’s pedestrian skills, in-cluding the frequency and pattern of looking, the so-phistication of last-minute checking procedures, and thespeed of making crossing judgements. Individual differ-ences in factors such as roadside experience, housingenvironment and especially exposure to traffic have alsobeen reported to contribute to the likelihood of childrenbeing involved in an accident (e.g. Grayson, 1975;Christie 1995). Relatively little attention has been givento individual differences within the road safety litera-ture, but the present findings do suggest the need forsome restraint when making strong claims, such as theoften quoted assertion of Sandels (1975:147) that ‘chil-dren are unreliable in traffic until childhood has ma-tured out of them’. While young children areundoubtedly easily distracted and are, therefore, neverentirely dependable on their own, it seems worth ex-ploring individual differences in road safety knowledgeand behaviour in more depth. Whitebread and Neilson(1999) suggest that cognitive skills may play a role, andwe also need more information about the influence offactors such as knowledge about road traffic andparental attitudes toward road safety (Zeedyk et al.,1997, 2000).

The primary purpose of this study was to gatherobservational data about how children behave onroads, basic information which is scarce within the

literature. However, the procedure we employed herecould also be useful for other purposes, in particularassessing the effectiveness of educational programmes,as our team has attempted to do in other work (Zeedyket al., 1997). Assessment of road safety schemes hastended to focus on knowledge, but the transfer betweenknowledge and behaviour is generally poor (Rothengat-ter, 1981; Ampofo-Boateng and Thomson, 1990). Un-less it can be demonstrated that training programmesimprove children’s behaviour on the roads, their effec-tiveness remains uncertain. Tasks such as this one couldbe used to determine whether an improvement in be-haviour has occurred as a result of training, or indeedto examine the correspondence between knowledge andbehaviour. Admittedly, the way in which we designedthis particular assessment required a large number ofadult staff and a substantial commitment of policetime, and not all research teams will have access to suchresources. It is possible that behavioural assessmenttasks might be developed which are similar in purposebut are easier to administer, as demonstrated in thepilot work of Dunbar et al. (1999).

As a final note, it is worth commenting that there iscontinuing disagreement as to what the content orobjectives of children’s safety education should be. Inthis study, we regarded seeking adult assistance, walk-ing (as opposed to running) and looking for alternativesto crossing between parked cars as exemplars of goodpractice. These principles comprise key components oftraditional British road safety education, yet it is notthe case that they are necessarily better practice.Grayson (1981) points out that European countriesoften advocate alternative principles. Many, for exam-ple encourage children to cross between parked cars.This is because it may be difficult for children to findany sites without parked cars at which to cross, thus,teaching children how to cope with this situation isarguably more sensible than teaching them to avoid it.Similarly, most countries take the view that pedestriansof any age should be encouraged to cross at junctions,in contrast with the UK, where junctions are regardedas too complex and hazardous for children. Runningacross roads, rather than being dangerous, may actuallybe safer because it reduces the amount of time childrenare exposed to risk on the road. Alternatively, Jo-hansson et al. (1996), working with schools in Swedenreported that the likelihood of a child being involved inan accident increases with training, an outcome thatobviously violates educational expectations. Somemembers of the road safety community feel stronglythat children as young as those in the present studyshould never cross roads on their own and that it mayeven be dangerous to involve them in training pro-grammes, if it creates a false sense of security (forchildren or their parents). Thus, the assumptions thatguide the development of educational programmes and

M.S. Zeedyk et al. / Accident Analysis and Pre�ention 34 (2002) 43–5050

research designs are not necessarily logical or accurate,but instead reflect cultural values and expectations. It isarguable that objectives of road safety training pro-grammes should more often emerge from research,rather than guiding them. Observational studies arevaluable in this regard, for it is in identifying whatchildren really do on the road that will help us as adultsto decide what and how we should be teaching them.

Acknowledgements

Appreciation is expressed to the children who partic-ipated so eagerly in the activities on which this study isbased and to the teachers, parents and colleagues in theRoad Safety Unit who helped us in carrying out theassessment. Sergeant Bill Carcary contributed to theinitial formulation of the treasure trail task and ShonaGoodall assisted with coding. Funding for this studywas provided by Tayside Police, and the grounds andfacilities in which it was conducted were made availableby the Managing Agents of Prospect Business Centre inDundee. Particular thanks are due to Joyce O’Fee andLinda Findlay of Clepington Primary School and toJim Young and Alastair Joss of Tayside Police, all ofwhom provided enthusiastic support for this researchprogramme.

References

Ampofo-Boateng, K., Thomson, J.A., 1990. Child pedestrian acci-dents: a case for preventative medicine. Health Education Re-search: Theory and Practice 5, 265–274.

Ampofo-Boateng, K., Thomson, J.A., Grieve, R., Pitcairn, T., Lee,D.N., Demetre, J.D., 1993. A developmental and training study ofchildren’s ability to find safe routes to cross the road. BritishJournal of Developmental Psychology 11, 31–45.

Christie, N., 1995. The High Risk Child Pedestrian: Socio-economicand Environmental Factors in their Accidents, Transport Re-search Laboratory, Project Report 117.

Davies, J., Guy, J., Murray, G., 1993. Let’s Decide-Walkwise. Trans-port Research Laboratory: Department of Transport.

Demetre, J.D., Lee, D.N., Grieve, R., Pitcairn, T.K., Ampofo-Boateng, K., Thomson, J.A., 1993. Young children’s learning onroad-crossing simulations. British Journal of Educational Psy-chology 63, 348–358.

Department of Transport, Environment, and the Regions, 1996.Child Development and Road Safety Education: Research Pro-gramme. United Kingdom. Ref. S214G; DPU 9/31/41.

Downing, C.S., 1981. Improving parental road safety practice andeducation with respect to preschool children. In: Foot, H.C.,

Chapman, A.J., Wade, F.M. (Eds.), Road Safety: Research andPractice. Praeger Publishers, East Sussex.

Dunbar, G., Lewis, V., Hill, R., 1999. Control processes and road-crossing skills. The Psychologist 12 (8), 398–399.

Foot, H., Tolmie, A., Thomson, J., McLaren, B., Whelan, K., 1999.Recognizing the hazards. The Psychologist 12 (8), 400–402.

Grayson, G.B., 1975. The Hampshire Child Pedestrian AccidentStudy. Department of the Environment, Transport, and RoadResearch Laboratory. Report LR 668.

Grayson, G.B., 1981. The identification of training objectives: whatshall we tell the children? Accident Analysis and Prevention 13,169–173.

Johansson, B.S., Drott, P., Astrom, B., 1996. Zone of free movementand children’s traffic accident risks. Uppsala University, Sweden,in press.

IRTAD, 1995. International Road Traffic Accident Database.Lee, D.N., Young, D.S., McLaughlin, C.M., 1984. A roadside simu-

lation of road crossing for young children. Ergonomics 17, 319–330.

Linden, H.R., van der, Goos, J.G., 1975. Gedrag en Verkeerson-veiligheid bij Kinderen. Verkeerskunde 12, 625–634.

Molen, H.H., van der, 1981. Child pedestrian’s exposure, accidentsand behaviour. Accident Analysis and Prevention 13, 193–224.

Molen, H.H., van der, 1983. Pedestrian Ethology. Doctoral disserta-tion, University of Groningen, Netherlands.

Rothengatter, J.A., 1981. Traffic Education for Young Children: AnEmpirical Approach. Lisse: Swets Publishing.

Sandels, S., 1975. Children in Traffic. Elek, London.Schioldborg, P., 1976. Children, traffic, and traffic training. Paper

presented at the Fifth Congress of the International Federation ofPedestrians, Geilo, Norway.

Scottish Development Department, 1989. Must Do Better: A StudyOf Child Pedestrian Accidents and Road Crossing Behaviour inScotland. Scottish Office, Central Research Unit Papers. Edin-burgh: Scottish Development Department.

Thomson, J.A., Ampofo-Boateng, K., Pitcairn, T., Grieve, R., Lee,D.N., Demetre, J.D., 1992. Behavioural group training of childrento find safe routes to cross the road. British Journal of Educa-tional Psychology 62, 173–183.

Thomson, J.A., Tolmie, A., Foot, H.C., McLaren, B., 1996. ChildDevelopment and the Aims of Road Safety Education: A Reviewand Analysis. Department of Transport; Road Safety ResearchReport No 1. HMSO, Norwich.

Valavuo, X., 1976. Verkehrsverhalten der Kinder und die SchulischeVerkehrerziehung. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Inssbruck,Germany.

Young, D.S., Lee, D.N., 1987. Training children in road crossingskills using a roadside simulation. Accident Analysis and Preven-tion 19, 327–342.

Whitebread, D., Neilson, K., 1999. Learning to cross the road:Cognition in action. The Psychologist 12 (8), 403–405.

Zeedyk, M.S., Carcary, W., Wallace, L., 1997. Children’s road safetythrough parents’ eyes. Poster presented at Annual Conference ofDevelopmental Section of British Psychological Society, Lough-borough.

Zeedyk, M.S., Wallace, L., Carcary, B., Jones, K., Larter, K., 2000.Children and road safety: Increasing knowledge does not improvebehaviour. British Journal of Educational Psychology, submittedfor publication.