National Impaired Driving Paid Media Campaign Evaluation

Alcohol-impaired driving is a leading cause of fatal crashes in the United States, accounting for 32% of all traffic fatalities in 2022. A 2022 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) study found that 54% of drivers involved in a serious injury or fatal crash tested positive for at least one drug, with active cannabinoids (25%) and alcohol (22%) the drugs most commonly found for trauma center cases; and with 39% positive for alcohol and 32% positive for active cannabinoids for medical examiner cases in the study. NHTSA uses safety messaging campaigns to raise public awareness and reduce impaired driving behaviors. The "Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over" paid media campaign is mandated by Congress and conducted annually in two waves around the Labor Day and the winter holiday seasons. These holiday seasons are targeted because both are periods of increased impaired driving. This project will evaluate these paid national media campaigns. The most recent evaluation of this campaign was conducted in 2012, using telephone surveys. This project will update the survey methodology, as well as the questionnaire. Given that phone survey response rates have declined significantly in recent years, NHTSA intends to use a nationally representative online panel to conduct this survey. The questionnaire will be updated to focus on not just alcohol-impaired driving, but drug-impaired driving as well, which was not evaluated in previous survey evaluations. The objective of this project is to assess public awareness of the risks of DUI/DUID and the influence of campaign messaging on individual’s perceptions of risk and their self-reported DUI/DUID behaviors. Findings from this study will be used to assess how public awareness of the media campaigns relates to self-reported impaired driving behaviors, pre- and post-campaign. Findings will also be used to improve NHTSA’s future safety messaging campaigns and to inform other agency programmatic efforts to reduce impaired driving. In addition to assessing awareness, messaging, and behaviors, this task order will also compare results to previous evaluations.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $22000000
• Contract Numbers:

  693JJ923RQ000361/693JJ924F00121N

• Sponsor Organizations:

  National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, D.C.  United States  20590
• Managing Organizations:

  National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, D.C.  United States  20590
• Performing Organizations:

  Eurekafacts

  Rockville, MD   
• Principal Investigators:

  Jeleniewski, Stacy

• Start Date: 20240919
• Expected Completion Date: 20290918
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• USDOT Program: Behavioral Safety Research

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Drugged drivers; Drunk drivers; Impaired drivers; Safety campaigns; Surveys; Traffic safety
• Subject Areas: Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Safety and Human Factors;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01938650
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
• Contract Numbers: 693JJ923RQ000361/693JJ924F00121N
• Files: RIP, USDOT
• Created Date: Dec 3 2024 2:28PM