Cars are reprogramming our brains so that we ignore the dangers of motor traffic, a study says

A new study reveals how unconscious biases lead us to overlook the negative impacts—i.e., the externalities—of car traffic. You could call this “car vision” or “motonormativity.”

A British study found that people have an ingrained tendency to accept risks and harms caused by motorists that they would not tolerate in other areas of life.

Researchers from Swansea University and the University of the West of England describe this “car blindness” as motonormativity and suggest that these unconscious biases influence policymaking. When policymakers automatically assume that moving from one place to another will be done by car, measures that make driving easier can at the same time harm public health.

This blind spot can lead to policies that increase air pollution and make travel more difficult and dangerous for everyone who moves around by other means. “If you asked a politician whether a new hospital should be inaccessible to a fifth of the population, they would of course say no,” said Professor Alan Tapp from the University of the West of England.

“Yet if you asked the same politician whether the hospital should be built on the outskirts of the city, many would likely see no problem with it, if they hold the kind of mindset we are examining. In practice, however, a hospital located outside the city is not very different from a situation where it is inaccessible to a fifth of households who do not have a car.”

We regularly see political decisions—from the location of public services to street design—that overlook the needs of people who do not drive and often force them into longer journeys or unsafe conditions for the convenience of motorists. These shared assumptions, which our study calls “motonormativity,” are a major reason why these issues often go unnoticed.

Appealing to exceptions
Co-author Professor Ian Walker from Swansea University adds: “It is nonsensical to argue that forcing people to breathe toxic air is a problem when it comes from a cigarette, but acceptable when it comes from a car. The underlying principle is the same, yet people in our study did not apply the same standards when evaluating the two.”

“We observed something similar with theft. If you leave your belongings on the street and someone steals them, only 37% of people think the police should act. But if you leave your car on the street and it is stolen, 87% think the police should intervene—even though a car is just one of your possessions.”

“It has long been assumed that people may unconsciously apply different standards when thinking about driving, leading to a bias known as special pleading. Our study aimed to reveal this phenomenon and show how strong these effects can be,” Walker said.

We have adapted our entire world to cars

These differences arose simply from changing one or two words in the questions posed to study participants. The survey was conducted by an independent research agency among 2,157 members of the public. Each respondent was randomly given either a set of questions about driving, or an identical set in which one or two words were changed so that they asked about the same underlying principles, but without mentioning driving.

As a result, people could shift from agreeing to disagreeing with a statement purely depending on whether it was framed as a driving-related issue. For example, 75% of respondents agreed with the statement: “People should not smoke in densely populated areas where others have to breathe cigarette smoke,” but only 17% agreed when it was phrased as: “People should not drive in densely populated areas where others have to breathe car exhaust fumes.”

The normal state of things

“If you have spent your whole life only knowing a world in which the needs of motorists come first, there is a strong chance you will come to see this as ‘normal’, or even the ‘right’ state of affairs,” said co-author of the study Dr Adrian Davis, also from the University of the West of England.

“When we excluded only people who do not drive from our survey, we found that even they used different standards when questions concerned driving. Their responses tended to mirror the views of drivers, which means this is not simply a matter of self-interest. It must be something deeper, rooted in our culture.”

In their study “Motonormativity: How social norms hide a fundamental threat to public health”, the team states that we are surrounded by an environment that supports car-based transport while systematically downplaying its negative impacts. These environments range from pedestrian crossings, where pedestrians must wait for permission to cross while drivers are automatically given priority, to advertising and media that normalise and excuse antisocial and dangerous behaviour behind the wheel.

The researchers argue that policymakers should become aware of their unconscious biases in this area and introduce systems that lead to more rational transport decision-making.

A car-dependent society

“Anyone making decisions should get used to asking: ‘What fundamental principle am I evaluating here, and would I still be comfortable with it if we weren’t talking about road transport?’” said Professor Walker.

“There are many dimensions to our dependence on cars – from social practices through infrastructure to political economy and more,” agrees Dr Giulio Mattioli from the Urban Development Research Group at TU Dortmund University in Germany, who was not involved in the study but described it as “illuminating”.

“This interesting paper sheds light on the cognitive dimension of car dependence, which is just as important,” Mattioli said.

“One of the key reasons many people still support car-dependent transport systems is that they see them as natural, inevitable, without alternatives, and normatively neutral. A very interesting finding of this study is that this view does not differ significantly between drivers and non-drivers.”

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