By Lic. María Cristina Isoba, Director of Road Safety Education and Research, Luchemos por la Vida. Argentina
We developed a multiple-approach plan aimed at the individual “in
the community.” We identified three main areas in the educational action:
mass media, government and traffic education.
We
understood that over and above the traditional action plans, carried out through
formal education and proposals from authorities, we needed to generate
a social change of attitude towards traffic accidents and behavior on the
streets, in order to provoke changes in the system of individual beliefs and
attitudes. To do this, we decided to influence public opinion with
a view to generating spaces of reflection and examination, and of social debate
regarding the problem of accidents and its relationship with individual and
social behaviors of all citizens, in general, and authorities, in particular.
With this in view, we decided to privilege work among:
In this field we carried out the following activities:
1)
Mass
awareness campaigns, by means of advertising spots on radio and TV,
since 1992, aiming continuosly at awakening interest and concern, that is,
awareness of the serious problem of traffic accidents in our country, in order
to increase the “perception of risk” among road users. We did this by
providing concrete information on safe behaviors connected with the main factors
causing accidents and mortality in traffic (speeding, drinking and driving,
night driving, seat belts, etc.) attempting an “argumentative” approach fit
for the main population group receiving the message.
2)
Work with
the press. We
established a permanent communication channel with the graphic press (newspapers
and general interest or specific field magazines), radio and TV, sending
information continuously pressing for:
-
Divulging topics on traffic safety and accident prevention in news and special
programs. For this, we send hundreds of short news clips to the main mass media
nationally every month. Our Association takes part in TV programs and is
interviewed in news, general interest programs, talk-shows, etc.
-
Presenting information highlighting the causes of accidents that have been
published, locally or internationally. For example, last year former President
Raúl Alfonsín was seriously injured in a car accident and a local newspaper
published on the front page that “he had been thrown out of the vehicle
because he wasn’t wearing a seat belt” and this made all the other media
touch this subject too. (Mass Media for Life Campaign).
3)
Follow up
of advertising and TV,
in particular:
-
Control and request of changes in commercial publicity or presentations showing
behaviors contrary to traffic safety that had positive connotations. As an
example, we asked Ericsson to change a graphic publicity that showed a beautiful
couple riding a motorbike blissfully without helmets.
-
Proposals to introduce comments or safe behaviors in fiction characters of
programs produced by local TV (Mass Media for Life Campaign) aiming at
establishing positive associations between safe behaviors and personal benefits.
4)
Public
recognition of positive actions of people
in different mass media who help promote traffic safety in every form, through
the Annual Luchemos por la Vida Awards, which include also professional
drivers who have been singled out for their safe driving, teachers who encourage
traffic education projects in their spheres of action, journalists,
professionals, companies, insurance companies, etc.
5)
Luchemos
por la Vida magazine,
sent free to all the town councils in the country and the main mass media and
public interested on it.
6)
Information
on the Internet.
We opened a web site in 1998 in order to divulge information and news
nationally and internationally. In this site we recently added a page open to
participation of the community called “Reports of dangerous situations in
traffic,” in which people can share their concern on local questions which
they consider a source of traffic unsafety. These reports are open for everybody
to see and are sent to the pertinent authorities.
We work with government authorities through:
-
Presentation of proposals of laws and actions in the field of enforcement and
organizing traffic, town planning and traffic education.
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Offering training courses for public officials on traffic and traffic education.
- For SCHOOLS,
through a National Traffic Education Plan, called
“Schools for Life,” aimed at students of elementary and high schools,
through participatory workshops. Training courses for teachers related to the
contents and the teaching material in classrooms, according to a systemic
approach to traffic.
-
For SAFE
DRIVERS. We have been dictating courses for new drivers and for people who are
renewing their driving license during the last five years in the Traffic
Administration of the city of Buenos Aires. We also teach courses on “safe or
defensive driving” for drivers of companies who aim at safe or defensive
driving.
The
possibilities of analyzing in detail the results we have achieved in these 10
years of work exceed the time we have available. The programs, each different in
scope, realization and achievements, have contributed to generating an important
change of attitude in the population at large regarding this problem. We believe
that approaching it from different fields, with a special emphasis on mass
media, has enabled us to create a new social awareness on this problem.
As an example, in the last polls previous to national and city elections, the
traffic and accidents problem was included by people among the10 most important
problems to be solved by politicians, who have been forced to include
it in their agendas, even though we are still far from the ideal or
desirable state. We observe important improvements in traffic behavior of the
community in specific topics, such as wearing seat belts in cars and helmets
on bicycles and motorcycles, improvement in respecting the priority of
pedestrians, etc. There have also
appeared small groups of people in different parts of the country who demand
greater safety and traffic education. Over and above what still needs to be
done, we understand that this comprehensive and multiple approach deserves to be
continued, taking into account results, and has to be deepened and considered
when the time comes to plan actions.
Presented at the 17th. World Congress of the International Association for Accident and Traffic Medicine. Stockholm, Sweden, 28-31 May 2000.-