Abstract

Present research is an attempt to theorize driving aptitude on which have not been studied much. Even though the original purpose of driving test battery was to screen examinees only based on ability indices, this study aimed to add functions to provide diagnostic indices on driving related aptitude as well as personality characteristics. Therefore, this study consists of two parts. The first part looked into driving aptitude composed of ability components based on the present commercial driving test battery. The second part explored personality characteristics necessary for safe driving. The criterion measures included in these sections of this study were accident records in study 1 and data on driving behavior in study 2. A canonical correlation between driving aptitudes and criterion measures, a discriminant analysis to distinguish accident oriented drivers, and causal modeling showed the relatively more effectiveness of personality characteristics to predict drivers' future driving behavior compared to ability components as well as demographic variables. Among ability components, speed calculation test, perceptual speed test, motor ability test were found to be useful to predict future accidents. Furthermore, psychoticism, impulsivity, and anger scales were found effective to explain driving behaviors. However, this research had several limitations. The first one was an excessively small explanatory power in study 1 in spite of a huge sample size. The second one was the primary findings of study 2 came from self-reported data.