Asymmetric relationship between driving and safety skills.

We hypothesized that the combination of self reported high ratings of driving skills and low ratings of safety skills creates a serious risk for road accident involvement. This study was aimed at investigating the asymmetric interplay between driving and safety skills among Turkish drivers (N=785) using the Driving Skills Inventory [Lajunen, T., Summala, H., 1995. Driver experience, personality, and skill and safety motive dimensions in drivers' self-assessments. Pers. Indiv. Differ. 19, 307-318]. The assumed asymmetric interactions were tested on a number of outcome variables representing risky driving using moderated regression analyses. The results revealed that driving skills moderated the effects of safety skills on six out of the eight outcome variables including the number of accidents, tickets, overtaking tendencies, speed on motorways, and aggressive driving style. Results suggested that high levels of safety skills buffer the negative effect of overconfidence resulting from exaggerated ratings of self-reported driving skills.