Dr. Neelima Chakrabarty | Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) (original) (raw)

Papers by Dr. Neelima Chakrabarty

International Journal of Indian Psychology, 2017

The available research highlights the vulnerability of the motorized two- wheeler riding youth as... more The available research highlights the vulnerability of the motorized two- wheeler riding youth as well as the importance of psychological factors in road traffic injuries. However there is scarcity of intervention programs for promotion of safe riding in youth. This study describes the preliminary field testing of an intervention program called SMART RIDERS aimed at promoting safe and respectful riding behaviors in motorised two- wheeler riding Indian youth. The SMART RIDERS program, developed through pilot surveys of two wheeler riders and pillion riders was field- tested using a controlled trial. Seventy five college-going youth formed the intervention group while 40 formed the control group. The intervention group underwent a brief interactive workshop followed by a one month application phase to popularize safe riding in their peers. The findings indicate significant positive changes in knowledge, attitudes relevant to road safety; self reported aggressive responses to frustrati...

39-47Road rage is a phenomenon which indicates that society is on the edge. Increasingly, aggress... more 39-47Road rage is a phenomenon which indicates that society is on the edge. Increasingly, aggression and violence have appeared to drift further into mainstream Indian society. Stories of school, shootings, workplace violence, viotence on the airlines and "road rage" abound. Road rage has recently been cited as equalling alcohol-impaired driving in the number of resultant motor vehicle accident related injuries and fatalities. The probability of becoming a victim on the roadways is significantly increased by the average exposure of the individual on the road. Presently, Indian roads and driving conditions are a point of discussion, moreover no comprehensive data is available as to how many persons die or are injured due to road rage cases. In the last three years in the capital of India sudden provocations prompted people to kill or physically assault each other. In 2005-2006 it topped the list of murder motives. In 2007 it was the second highest cause in murder list. This paper discusses results of opinion survey of experts as well as of the drivers & commuters, detailed analyses of the causes and timewise, vehicle-wise, location-wise aggressive behaviour among drivers. Paper further highlights action plan for mitigating measures for reducing aggressive behaviour among Indian drivers

Driving is a complex task requiring a vigilant mind and sound health. An alert mind always helps ... more Driving is a complex task requiring a vigilant mind and sound health. An alert mind always helps in proper decision making and faster reactions which in turn can help in reduction of road accidents. Major cause of accidents has been identified as improper driving behaviour. Hence it is important to understand and study the influence of driver behaviour on road traffic accidents. Heighted emotions such as stress, anger or upset are a form of distraction that can significantly impede drivers’ ability to spot and respond to hazards. Research has found that drivers who suffer from workrelated stress are more likely to speed and take other risks while driving and more like to be involved in serious crashes. All drivers are exposed to stressful driving situations from time to time, even if they do not generally suffer from stress in everyday life. Traffic jams, tailgating and inconsiderate behaviour from other drivers can cause stress. Some drivers react angrily to stressful driving situa...

122-127Road traffic crashes are still a major cause of death, injuries and economic loss in India... more 122-127Road traffic crashes are still a major cause of death, injuries and economic loss in India due to increasing number of old and unmaintained vehicles, inexperienced drivers and increasing number of aggressive and impulsive road users. But, unfortunately road safety is still not considered as a major priority for a sustainable transport system. So, there is an urgent demand to develop comprehensive Road Safety Policies. The key components of such policies should be based on strong commitments in increased acceptance of road safety as a problem, development of safety culture in society and coordination of all the policy makers. To inculcate safety culture within the society, dynamic safety standards should be introduced in all components of the transport system to stimulate continuous development. In particular this applies to: vehicle component for developing safety awareness among consumers and manufacturers; road component for introducing compulsory Road Safety Audits of Roads at the construction stage and develop safety assessment methods for existing roads, and driver component for continuous development of effective testing and evaluation system with awareness plan for driver licensing, education and testing of professional drivers. A case study conducted by CSIR-Central Road Research Institute for driver components highlights that the specially trained drivers had significantly give superior performance in different evaluation criteria (tests) as compared to the normally trained group of the drivers. Present paper emphasizes the urgent demand of an effective and uniform driver testing and training system for inculcating safety culture in India

Indian Journal of Social Psychiatry, 2020

Background: Music is a popular pastime and an essential part of our lives that has the power to c... more Background: Music is a popular pastime and an essential part of our lives that has the power to change one's state of mind. The melody, lyrics, and rhythm combine together to create creative symphonies that can either fill one with energy, enthusiasm, and positivity, or take one to melancholic mood. Music is known for its positive influence and therapeutic qualities but at times it can be distracting as well especially when your other faculties are engaged in doing other work. Driving is one such activity where music, though a joy to listen to, can prove disastrous through distractions. Materials and Methods: This study with the help of Vienna Test System examines the psychological impact of different genre of music on a driver's driving abilities and possible reaction and response amidst exposure to multiple stimuli, which could be correct, omitted, or delayed. The sample included 16 individuals who were drivers. The sample was classified into two groups of equal numbers with one named “young” comprised of people up to the age of 30 years while the other named “old,” were more than 45 years old. The participants were asked to undertake driving test, “with” and “without” the music. Using the Vienna Tests System, acoustic and visual stimuli using soft classical, hard rock, and jazz music were used during the driving test. Results: A two-way mixed analysis of variance test and differences by t-test examined the relationship of age and impact of music on individual's reaction time (RT) and number of correct, omitted, or delayed responses, which was found significant. Conclusion: The participants under the group of “with music” clearly resulted in better performance showing lower RT, compared to the situation where no music was played.

Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine, 2019

Objectives: Aggressive driving and road accidents are major concerns in the public health sector.... more Objectives: Aggressive driving and road accidents are major concerns in the public health sector. This study aimed to explore risk to aggressive and risky behaviors on the road in two-wheeler riding young men. Methods: The study comprised 433 young male two-wheeler riders from an urban city of India. A two-wheeler riding survey that captured subjective perception of difficulty in managing anger in general, easy provocability to anger, and aggressive and risky behaviors on the road, and Negative Mood Regulation (NMR) scale were administered. Results: Of the 433 participants, 83 (19%) reported experiencing problematic anger in general, whereas 175 (40.42%) did not endorse experiencing problematic anger. Based on this, two groups were formed, namely, problematic anger-present group and problematic anger-absent group. The problematic anger-present group reported high score on easy provocability to anger, difficulty in controlling anger, specific motives related to riding fast than usual, and severity of aggressive responses to frustrating situations while riding, and low score on NMR scale. Statistical analysis revealed a significant difference between the groups. Conclusion: This study highlights the relevance of assessing subjective perception of problematic anger in two-wheeler riding young men. This has implications for designing interventions for enhancing road safety.

Commuting to work by bus is still one of the major transportation system in Delhi. Delhi governme... more Commuting to work by bus is still one of the major transportation system in Delhi. Delhi government has introduced several reforms in services and it is found that the per capita trip rate (excluding walk trips) has increased from 0.72 in 1981 to 0.87 in 2001. It is estimated that per capita trip rate may reach to 1.2 by 2021 in Delhi. There is always a gap between satisfactions of user due to increase in trip rate and offered services by Delhi Transport Corporation. The major challenges to provide services are in terms of quality service indicators such as travel time, comfort, information system, accessibility, safety, different type of service offered, customer service, environmental impact etc. to improve overall quality by transport authority. To know the service performance of bus transportation one of the good method is User Perception Survey. The users' perception about services offered by transit system plays a essential role in its success. It is therefore important to...

During the last two decades, developing countries such as India have been exhibiting rapid increa... more During the last two decades, developing countries such as India have been exhibiting rapid increase in human population and vehicles, and increase in road accidents. Inappropriate driving behaviour is considered one of the major causes of road accidents in India as compared to defective geometric design of pavement or mechanical defects in vehicles. Apart from the other factors causing accidents such as poor road design ,vehicle conditions, driver characteristics of frequent traffic violations, increase in crashes due to self-centred driving, etc. it can also be resulted in conditions such as lack of psychophysical abilities e.g. poor eye sight, poor vision at night time, glare blindness etc. Hence, improved driver screening facilities accompanied by availability of good driving aids such as anti glare glasses can be an effective and preventive measure to inhibit crash risks. This article is based on a case study jointly done by CSIR-Central Road Research Institute and Institute of ...

Road rage is a phenomenon which indicates that society is on edge. Increasingly, aggression and v... more Road rage is a phenomenon which indicates that society is on edge. Increasingly, aggression and violence has appeared to drift further into mainstream Indian society. Stories of school shootings, workplace violence, violence on the airlines, and “road rage” abound. Road rage has recently been cited as equaling alcohol-impaired driving in the number of resultant motor vehicle accident related injuries and fatalities (Martinez, 19971 and Snyder, 1997). The probability of becoming a victim on the roadways is significantly increased by the average exposure of the individual on the road. Presently Indian roads and driving conditions are a point of discussion moreover no comprehensive data is available to how many persons die or are injured due to road rage cases. In the last three years in the capital of India sudden provocation prompted people to kill or physically assault each other .In 2005-2006 it topped the list of murder motives. In 2007 it was the second highest cause in murder li...

This study deals with the estimation of impact of various Intelligent Transportation Modules such... more This study deals with the estimation of impact of various Intelligent Transportation Modules such as APMS, VMS and ATIS in New Delhi. Major findings of a survey of drivers or users conducted in New Delhi are presented in this report. From this study, the demand for the particular types of traffic / traveler information was also undertaken in order to understand the effectiveness of the system in the way they affect the users / drivers' transport choices. The personal and travel characteristics of the users / drivers which affect the users / drivers desire for different types of information were found. And also it is found that many of those factors are in direct relationship with the driver's awareness on Intelligent Transportation System.

Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2013

Adverse weather and road conditions, following rain, fog and temperature fluctuations are the maj... more Adverse weather and road conditions, following rain, fog and temperature fluctuations are the major causes of an elevated risk of traffic accidents and compromised flow in India. Drivers can control their risks at several levels, however it is useful to consider driver behaviour as hierarchically organized, separating tactical and operational on road control and level decision making. The former is exemplified by compensating for the weather related risk with adaptive driving behaviour, such as lower speeds, longer headways and avoidance of overtaking on two lane roads. However in countries like India where hard winters and impaired road conditions are not unusual enough to stop daily routines, people are not free to make safe travel decisions, despite their safe intentions. So it is in need to study driver behaviour and crash characteristics during Adverse Weather Conditions. Objective: The main objective of this paper is to study the visual traits and psychomotor behaviour of the drivers along with their choice of speed, reaction time and driving behaviour during adverse weather under simulated and realistic environment conditions. Methodology: individual driver responds to certain stimuli, and individual characteristics of the drivers. During the data collection, primary factors which were measured through different psychophysical tests e.g. visual fatigue test, visual acuity test, driving simulation tests to analyze the crash characteristics and risk taking practices, reaction time under adverse weather conditions.-Box with three came eye movements along with road assets during the various driving situations. Different driving cycles were also obtained during the data acquisition. The findings: crashes during rain and foggy conditions during simulated adverse weather conditions. Different driving cycles were analyzed after the data processing.

The SIJ Transactions on Industrial, Financial & Business Management, 2019

Increasing number of road accidents coupled with increasing vehicle population means an increase ... more Increasing number of road accidents coupled with increasing vehicle population means an increase in the number of aggressive road users resulting in incidence of road rage. Inexperienced drivers often experience anxiety due to their underdeveloped and declining skills, which influence their behaviour. To highlight the effectiveness of correct training on the drivers' performance, this research work was initiated at Traffic Psychological Laboratory in CSIR-CRRI. In this study, a purposive sample of two groups of 102 drivers was selected and they were administered the road sign test. Findings: The analysis of the data highlights that maximum level of awareness about road sign of driving on hill roads (89%), seat belts usage while driving (89%) the safe way of stopping during emergency (40%), safe place of parking the vehicle (39%) and road markings (27%). Overall, drivers have shown average and above average level of awareness 52% to 77%.

Indian Journal of Health Sciences and Biomedical Research (KLEU)

Transportation Research Procedia

Exposure and Health, 2016

Current Science, 2016

Among the human factors that influence safe driving, visual skills of the driver can be considere... more Among the human factors that influence safe driving, visual skills of the driver can be considered fundamental. This study mainly focuses on investigating the effect of visual functions of drivers in India on their road crash involvement. Experiments were conducted to assess vision functions of Indian licensed drivers belonging to various organizations, age groups and driving experience. The test results were further related to the crash involvement histories of drivers through statistical tools. A generalized linear model was developed to ascertain the influence of these traits on propensity of crash involvement. Among the sampled drivers, colour vision, vertical field of vision, depth perception, contrast sensitivity, acuity and phoria were found to influence their crash involvement rates. In India, there are no efficient standards and testing methods to assess the visual capabilities of drivers during their licensing process and this study highlights the need for the same.