The development of road safety literacy: self-reflective study by Chinese learner drivers in Australia

This paper reports a self-reflective study on the development of road safety literacy by two Chinese learner drivers in Australia. It finds that learning to drive is an activity that requires advanced road safety literacy, which enables road users to identify and decode road signs, understand their legal meaning and decide what appropriate action to take in the interest of public well-being. It also suggests that learner-drivers have different literacy capabilities in different domains of life depending upon their cultural background and life history. It is recommended that a key aim for road safety education and training be the development of a higher level of road safety literacy for the public in general and drivers in particularly. It is also recommended that recording one's own experiences after each driving practice to develop self-reflective drivers could be an effective way to assist learner drivers. This could be especially learner drivers for whom English is a foreign language, enabling them to improve their level of road safety literacy. (a) For the covering entry of this conference, please see ITRD abstract no. E216298.