Self-Assessment of Driving Abilities of Deaf and Hearing Drivers

This research aim is to evaluate how deaf and hearing traffic participants assess their driving abilities and to determine frequency of communication, traffic violations and traffic accidents that respondents are involved in. Sample of respondents was comprised of 60 drivers, 30 deaf and 30 hearing. Qualitative and quantitative analysis was used in data processing. Self-assessment was conducted by conducting a survey about their driving abilities and abilities of the other subsample of respondents. Differences in answers were determined with t-test. Results indicate that both subsamples assess their driving abilities as very good and their driving as safe. There are differences in the safety aspect of the driving, where hearing drivers expressed some doubt about this aspect when it comes to deaf drivers. By assessing frequency of communication during driving, it has been concluded that hearing drivers communicate more often and have more involvement in traffic accidents. When it comes to correlation between frequency of communication and number of committed traffic violations, no significant differences were observed between the two subsamples. Despite self-assessment of driving ability being very good and safe by both subsamples of respondents, traffic accidents are a very frequent occurrence. Although, conversation with passengers is not prohibited, drivers should be advised to reduce it to minimum, as it has proven to be one of the significant distracting factors when it comes to driving.