One-third of U.S. parents worried their young driver could cause a car crash

Many U.S. parents are worried that their teen or young adult is going to cause a wreck through their unsafe driving, a new survey says. About one in three parents worry that their young driver could cause a motor vehicle accident, according to the University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health.

However, these worries don’t appear to weigh heavily on parents.

Nearly all parents believe their child drives as well or better than other young drivers, and only a quarter said they’d imposed consequences for unsafe driving habits, the survey found.

“Our report suggests a disconnect between parents’ concerns about risky teen driving and their confidence in their own child’s skills behind the wheel,” Mott Poll Co-Director Sarah Clark said in a news release.

More than half of parents (51%) said they’d witnessed at least one unsafe driving behavior by their child, including:

• 44% who witnessed aggressive driving like speeding, tailgating or road rage
• 25% who saw distracted driving such as texting or multitasking while behind the wheel
• 17% who saw driving while impaired, including while sleepy, emotionally upset or intoxicated on alcohol or weed

“Distracted, impaired and aggressive driving are major contributors to crashes,” Clark said. “Even behaviors that seem minor, like glancing at a phone or driving while exhausted, can significantly slow reaction time and increase crash risk.”

Despite this, 96% of parents said their child’s driving is either average or better than that of their peers.

Even parents who’ve observed distracted or impaired driving tended to give their child good marks for their driving ability.

And shockingly, parents who’ve witnessed aggressive driving were actually less likely to rate their child as a worse driver compared to peers, the poll found.

“Many parents do not connect risky driving behaviors to being a good driver,” Clark said. “Often, parents engage in these same risky driving behaviors and may not view them as dangerous.”

Only 24% of parents said they’d taken steps to rein in their child’s risky driving. These stops included using a monitoring device (13%); taking away driving privileges (6%); refusing the use of their car (8%); or threatening to stop paying for car insurance (6%).

“Parents are often the most influential driving instructors their teens will ever have,” Clark said, “Setting clear expectations, modeling safe driving and enforcing consequences when needed can make a real difference.”

The new survey included responses from 1,780 parents of 16- to 25-year-olds who were surveyed in February. The margin of error is plus or minus 1 to 3 percentage points.

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