New Risk Management Findings from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Outlined (Narrative Persuasion and Stigma: Using News Accounts To Denormalize Texting While Driving)

2021 MAR 29 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Data detailed on Risk Management have been presented. According to news reporting originating from Blacksburg, Virginia, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Despite nearly universal texting while driving bans in U.S. states, distracted driving still poses a major risk for American motorists and pedestrians on a daily basis. We argue texting while driving behavior, due to its cultural, social, and psychological motivations, may be addressed by cultivating a stigma to denormalize TWD much in the same way public health campaigns and bans did with tobacco use.”

Our news editors obtained a quote from the research from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, “While extant strategies may similarly stigmatize this risky behavior, we contend the stigmatizing effect of news narratives offers an untapped and unexamined resource. In this paper we draw on emergent findings in narrative persuasion work to present an exploratory analysis and evidence indicates news narratives, through narrative engagement, can both stigmatize TWD behavior and diminish attitudes toward distracted driving. These initial findings are then validated against an independent sample.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “If applied widely, this method may be applied to increase social pressure against distracted driving, leading to fewer people engaging in TWD behavior, and making roads safer.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Narrative Persuasion and Stigma: Using News Accounts To Denormalize Texting While Driving. Accident Analysis & Prevention, 2021;151:105876. Accident Analysis & Prevention can be contacted at: Pergamon-elsevier Science Ltd, The Boulevard, Langford Lane, Kidlington, Oxford OX5 1GB, England. (Elsevier - www.elsevier.com; Accident Analysis & Prevention - http://www.journals.elsevier.com/accident-analysis-and-prevention/)

The news editors report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Dan Tamul, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061, United States. Additional authors for this research include Catherine Einstein, Jessica Hotter, Madison Lanier, Laura Purcell and Jordan Wolf.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aap.2020.105876. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)