We’ve all experienced some sort of road rage, whether if it was us experiencing road rage or witnessing someone else experiencing road rage. However, there is a fine line between being upset and road rage. Road rage involves action, in which your road rage can have the ability to endanger the lives of everyone around you. If this happens the best course of action to take is to attend a defensive driving course.
Here we will explain the causes of road rage and how to best handle the situation.
What is Road Rage?
Road rage is commonly defined as an act of anger that is caused by incidents or any type of inconvenience that happens while driving. When road rage occurs normally the person believes that he or she was wronged in some way and needs to take revenge on the person that did them wrong.
When you think of road rage some may think only shouting. While this is a common form of road rage, it’s not the only one. There are other more violent forms of road rage that can cause harm to others.
There have been approximately 12,610 injuries and about 218 murders due to road rage in the last 7 years. In the U.S alone an estimate of 37% of road rage incidents involved the use a firearm.
Common Forms of Road Rage
Everyone is different. Therefore, trying to predict everyone’s reaction to road rage is almost impossible, because road rage can manifest itself in many ways.
For the most part, in the event of road rage, individuals will not have the ability to control their emotions. Due to this, they may experience the following:
- Screaming
- Tailgating
- Honking
- Blocking traffic
- Cutting people off
- Speeding
- Ramming
- Weaving
- Following someone
- Confrontation outside of the car
The Cause of Road Rage
Ana Jovanovic, a Psychotherapist, stated in an NBC News article that road rage has nothing to do with traffic. Instead, sometimes road rage can be a result of being upset over something that happened at work or throughout the day.
The angrier thoughts that are in our minds, the more chance of having an angry outburst forming can result in road rage.
Some of the common causes of road rage include:
- Traffic
- Impatience
- Seeing a distractive driver
- Anonymity
Preventing Road Rage
An easy way to prevent road rage is to educate yourself on road rage. The best way to do this is by taking a defensive driving course or a safe driving course.
Other things you can do to prevent road includes:
- Leaving on time
- Calming down when something happens
- Have empathy
- Don’t honk
If you try these simple solutions, then it will lower the chances of you getting road rage and also lower the chances of someone else getting hurt.
