A Driven Man
An article in the UK's Times(11/25/06) claims that "there will be fewer differences between the sexes in the future." The article is part of a series ("Gender Fender", 11/22/06; "Speed Camera expose gender gap", 11/22/06) inspired by Corbett and Caramlau (2006), whose study of 1995 vs. 2003 attitudes towards speed cameras found substantial gender differences, leading the authors to conclude that "it may not always be appropriate to 'drivers' en masse...[when] stating what drivers feel." The Times' assertion that gender differences are decreasing seems to be based on the study's finding that both sexes are finding ways to manipulate the speed camera system (such as slowing down as approaching a camera, and speeding up afterward).
Despite the Times series frequent assertions that women are stereotyped as poor drivers, Glendon et al (1996) found that most drivers felt young males were the least competent drivers, and most likely to get in an accident, confirming similar results found by Matthews and Moran (1986). A statistical review by Evans (2006) suggests that the difference between male and female accident rates has remained fairly steady despite changes in society, which Evans calls support for a biological cause.
I've been lucky enough not to trip over the Times before, and with any luck, I won't find anything worth covering there again. The oh-so-precious "women driver" jokes permeated all the articles they published on this topic, and finding the sources for their claims was less than intuitive. I suppose it's useful for me to be reminded that sexism is still rampant in huge swathes of society. Then again, I conveniently forget how much I used to indulge in that sort of humor, and I'm probably "forgetting" doing it more recently. I used to wear a man's hat and sunglasses when I drove, in the hope that other driver's wouldn't see me at the wheel and classify me as a "woman driver." I've never been confident about my driving ability, and I didn't want to contribute to the stereotype. Of course, my motives for not wanting to be seen as a woman were probably more complicated, but I wasn't aware of it at the time.
Despite the Times series frequent assertions that women are stereotyped as poor drivers, Glendon et al (1996) found that most drivers felt young males were the least competent drivers, and most likely to get in an accident, confirming similar results found by Matthews and Moran (1986). A statistical review by Evans (2006) suggests that the difference between male and female accident rates has remained fairly steady despite changes in society, which Evans calls support for a biological cause.
I've been lucky enough not to trip over the Times before, and with any luck, I won't find anything worth covering there again. The oh-so-precious "women driver" jokes permeated all the articles they published on this topic, and finding the sources for their claims was less than intuitive. I suppose it's useful for me to be reminded that sexism is still rampant in huge swathes of society. Then again, I conveniently forget how much I used to indulge in that sort of humor, and I'm probably "forgetting" doing it more recently. I used to wear a man's hat and sunglasses when I drove, in the hope that other driver's wouldn't see me at the wheel and classify me as a "woman driver." I've never been confident about my driving ability, and I didn't want to contribute to the stereotype. Of course, my motives for not wanting to be seen as a woman were probably more complicated, but I wasn't aware of it at the time.