Attitude of Drivers Towards Road Traffic Safety and its Association with Occurred Road Traffic Crashes Among Jimma Zone Public Transport Drivers, Southwest Ethiopia

Background: Road traffic crash (RTC) has become a global burden. The world health organization's (WHO) global report on road traffic safety of 2015 shows that about 1.25 million deaths observed due RTC which means every 24 seconds someone dies on the road and predicted to become the fifth leading cause of death by 2030. RTC was identified as the leading cause of death especially among young people of 15-29 years, and low and middle-income countries. Attitude of drivers towards road traffic safety (RTS) is one of the most important indicator for RTC which needs due emphasis to tackle this tragedy. Methods: The study was conducted among 398 public transport drivers that selected randomly. Driver Attitude Questionnaire (DAQ) that comprises 16 items was applied to investigate drivers' attitudes towards RTS with four Point Likert-scales (1-4, refers to totally disagree, disagree, agree and totally agree respectively for positive statements and reverse for negative statements where scale 1 belongs to totally agree). The driver was considered to have positive attitude if agrees/accepts items of positive statements and disagree/against items of negative statements. DAQ assesses attitude of drivers towards RTS with its four domains (Alcohol, close following, overtaking and speeding). Cross tabs and binary logistic regression were applied to determine the association of attitude related variables with occurrence of RTC. A p-value less than 0.05 was declared as statistically significant. Results: From the total 398 drivers participated on the study, males accounted 394 (99%). The mean age of the respondents was 32.11±9.133 years that range from 20–60 years. They had an average driving experience of 6.72 years. Majority of participants [219(55.0%)] had less than 5 years of driving experience; More than one third [142 (35.7%)] of the drivers were reported to sustained RTC. From the applied DAQ questionnaires with 16 items to assess drivers attitude towards RTS, about nine items of DAQ variables with negative statements (speed limitation problems, interest of competition, taking risks, perception of obeying regulation as childish, mimicking peer fraud, disobey regulation when no police, attitude about offense punishment, alcohol drinking and overtaking in front vehicles) were statistically significantly associated with the occurred RTCs among drivers. There was statistically significant difference observed among drivers' attitude scores of Likert-scales with occurred RTCs. In nutshell, drivers who sustained RTC (35.7%) were statistically associated with lower scores of Likert-scale (totally agreed) to those items with negative statements. Conclusion and Recommendation: The occurrence of RTC was more likely among drivers with negative attitude/behavior (who agreed/very agreed to items with negative statements and/or who disagreed/very disagreed to items with positive statements) which needs due emphasis for tackling this tragic event in collaboration to enhance drives attitude towards RTS by providing awareness.