Driver attitudes

[Nonnie]

I went to a presentation last night and was told that by the age of 13, a child has it's attitude towards driving and general road use already firmly implanted in his/her mind which I found fascinating.

So, therefore if you drive like a twat with no consideration for your fellow road users or you shout and swear and are aggressive, so will your children be and it's very hard to reverse this.


Listened to a few stories last night too and one I will share. OK, small child (10 or 11) on an on road cycling proficiency course being very aggressive towards the other children on their bikes and generally behaving badly and trying to intimidate his fellow cyclists, instructor wonders why he behaves like this until he is told that this is how the child's father drives.

I really find this stuff fascinating especially the fact that by 13, if the child isn't respectful of other road users, he is unlikely to ever be.

So, I guess if we want to produce better drivers in the future, we all share a responsibility to ensure our own driving standards are good.

Discuss...... (if you can be bothered or maybe I'm just obsessed)

[Melnie Mouse]

good and fair point. They do say the children learn from us, it's about time not just with driving, but with everything kids should learn more respect, and not be so lazy in jobs and life, is all that from us?

When I was young, i was never like the lad here at work, that comes in consistently late, the boss says oh he's young, you must have been like that, no I wasn't. You were almost 'afraid' to be late. The cheek these youngsters come out with too.

Speaking to someone else in another work force, of hairdressing, it's the kids of salon that moan and moan about washing towels and sweeping floor they want to do the best bits, of course everybody does, but the 'naff' jobs need to be done aswell, we just got on with it, they do anything to get out of it, and go and hide round the back and text on their phone for hours and hours!

I can't believe how lazy and rude these kids have become and no respect for rules....

[banditloon]

Saves me posting a new comment on crap driving standards of impatient drivers!!

I parked in my local Tesco / Esso petrol garage this morning to purchase my breakfast for work. Paid for my munchies (mmm cheese twirls :D), started the bike up and watched this prize ijit drive around the cars on the forecourt and stop right behind my bike. He wants the parking space. Sits there revving his engine and as I get on, the car parked next to me starts to reverse out of the parking space. So I walk the Monster back towards the BMW (has to be a Beemer!!) and he starts revving his engine again to 'try' and make me speed up my actions. Where this usually makes me go slower, and it did! I let the taxi driver finish his reversing (which was poor, because Beemer idiot had blocked the forecourt), Beemer driver starts revving again and leaving his foot on his accelarator. By this time, my little Nessie has warmed up enough just for me to turn my head, look at the Beemer driver in the eye, give him the finger and rev the bollocks out of the 900 v-twin.

The cab driver waved thanks for letting him out, the (Polish) Beemer driver was quiet after getting the full blast of Viper cans at him and I pootled off to work in a nice quiet manner :D

Bloody impatient f**kwits!

Now reading this post, it makes me wonder what his dad taught him in Poland... :chuckle:

Doesn't really surprise me about this news. Kids learn everything from those around them and then just think it is the 'normal' way to act. Not sure who I can blame my motorcycle riding technique on though :chuckle:

[Will]

I went to a presentation last night and was told that by the age of 13, a child has it's attitude towards driving and general road use already firmly implanted in his/her mind which I found fascinating.

So, therefore if you drive like a twat with no consideration for your fellow road users or you shout and swear and are aggressive, so will your children be and it's very hard to reverse this.


Listened to a few stories last night too and one I will share. OK, small child (10 or 11) on an on road cycling proficiency course being very aggressive towards the other children on their bikes and generally behaving badly and trying to intimidate his fellow cyclists, instructor wonders why he behaves like this until he is told that this is how the child's father drives.

I really find this stuff fascinating especially the fact that by 13, if the child isn't respectful of other road users, he is unlikely to ever be.

So, I guess if we want to produce better drivers in the future, we all share a responsibility to ensure our own driving standards are good.

Discuss...... (if you can be bothered or maybe I'm just obsessed)

Disagree - it sounds like modern, middle class, Graudian reader, looney lefty excuses to me - I mean, all this behaviour stuff is down to Nature NOT Nurture as we all jolly well know - innit? :look:

[Headhunter]

look at the Beemer driver in the eye, give him the finger and rev the bollocks out of the 900 v-twin.




Brilliant! Has made my Friday afternoon. :thumbsup:

[Nonnie]

Disagree - it sounds like modern, middle class, Graudian reader, looney lefty excuses to me - I mean, all this behaviour stuff is down to Nature NOT Nurture as we all jolly well know - innit? :look:

I actually believe environment beats genetics most of the time.

[gremlin]

bogwoppits produce little bogwoppits ..!!!!!!!
if the parents dont know how to act responsibly what chance do the kids have of knowing what is responsible behaviour ??

[Chris & Nean]

Do all you can for your offspring if your inclined to do so, try real hard as a parent and try to be an example, or just beget em and forget about em, if its your inclination, but rest assured, once it gets to the stage that your progeny experience the reality of the sickening crunching thud of metal and plastic and glass and human flesh crashing, meeting and combining at high velocity,! everything at that point will change, and maybe for the good or maybe for the bad but sometimes forever. Gota control ego on the roads, and our children have to learn the lesson too and as soon as they start to use the roads, no arguments about it this time, learn quick and everything they knew before is meaningless now, its shear survival now. I taught both my sons to drive, but not to pass their driving tests.

[yeharrr]

Sunday school followed by Dad's army or the Good life should sort them out.
Might work on the kids also.

[gremlin]

It all fell apart when discipline was taken out of schools. My mum was a teacher in the toughest school in Norwich, she used to give the slipper regularly, the people she taught still send her christmas cards, she retired about 10 years ago due to stress. When her house was broken into the ex pupils dealt with the perpetrator.
Now teachers get ten bells kicked out of them and they can't do anything to defend themselves. If kids aren't disciplined how do they learn right from wrong. My daughter was allowed two misbehaviours then her legs were slapped, I could take her anywhere, now she's said she will do the same with her daughter, she knew the rules and said she realises why I was so strict.

[Will]

I actually believe environment beats genetics most of the time.

I strongly suspect that genetics pre-determines how we react to our environment in addition to giving us our fundamental, unchangable behavioural characteristics - there is an ever increasing amount of evidence (twin studies etc) to show that the most important factors in behavioural characteristics are inherited.

My personal experience also supports this - I have two kids who have had the same upbringing but are both so totally different in character that it could only be explained by genetics - one so obviously inherited her behaviour characteristics from my family and the other from my wife's family.

[RSpete]

I suspect its overly simplistic to blame just one thing or assume that there is one easy solution.
There are many parents who are pulling their hair out as a result of their little angel turning into a sullen monster the second it hits puberty.
I have some friends whose two children are chalk and cheese, same parents same discipline different results.
Having said that I tend to side with Nonnie with regards to environment being the major influence.
There is a huge amount of pressure on parents just to provide the material things that, often, it seems holidays, playstations etc. etc. are more important than caring and nuturing, this with a me me me selfish materialistic society tends to mean that the responsibilty for another that parenting brings gets overlooked.
This combined with some parents behaving as though their offspring were an accessory they have now grown tired of or, and possibly as bad, they take the attitude that their child can do no wrong and refuse to discipline or support discipline where they are concerned does nothing to help.
Parenting is a responsibility that we seem to think comes naturally. The reported evidence seems to say otherwise.
( I suspect though there are still more good than bad out there and the fact that a thread like this even exists tends to show that we still care)

Just don't get me started on politicians, lawyers or estate agents. Blood sucking parasites each and every one!

[Will]

I suspect its overly simplistic to blame just one thing or assume that there is one easy solution.
There are many parents who are pulling their hair out as a result of their little angel turning into a sullen monster the second it hits puberty.
I have some friends whose two children are chalk and cheese, same parents same discipline different results.
Having said that I tend to side with Nonnie with regards to environment being the major influence.
There is a huge amount of pressure on parents just to provide the material things that, often, it seems holidays, playstations etc. etc. are more important than caring and nuturing, this with a me me me selfish materialistic society tends to mean that the responsibilty for another that parenting brings gets overlooked.
This combined with some parents behaving as though their offspring were an accessory they have now grown tired of or, and possibly as bad, they take the attitude that their child can do no wrong and refuse to discipline or support discipline where they are concerned does nothing to help.
Parenting is a responsibility that we seem to think comes naturally. The reported evidence seems to say otherwise.
( I suspect though there are still more good than bad out there and the fact that a thread like this even exists tends to show that we still care)

Just don't get me started on politicians, lawyers or estate agents. Blood sucking parasites each and every one!


Where is the scientific evidence that shows that you can really change someones character by Nurture?

If you excercise a strict authoritarian regime over your kids then maybe you teach them temporarily, through fear (always a good motivator) to restrain their behaviour; but you cannot change their inherited behavioural characteristics.

[Sqwifeve]

Where is the scientific evidence that shows that you can really change someones character by Nurture?

If you excercise a strict authoritarian regime over your kids then maybe you teach them temporarily, through fear (always a good motivator) to restrain their behaviour; but you cannot change their inherited behavioural characteristics.

Well if everyone thought that was completely true, we could just stop any training programes, therapy of any sort and just give up, as no-ones got any capacity to change them ? Don't you believe you've been able to learn anything? Despite your characteristics? Surely your characteristics just effect how you can can learn?

[RSpete]

I have three kids, all very different characters who I think have turned out pretty well. Their charecters are almost certainly genetic however I would like to think that the way they were brought up had some influence on how they turned out.
As Gremlin put so well "bogwoppits produce little bogwoppits ..!!!!!!!"
If your knuckle dragging, wife beating slob and his other half are the only role models a child has I do believe that child will be at a disadvantage over one that is raised in a caring family.
However my main point was that rather than it just being one thing it is a combination that influences the outcome.
As far as mine are concerned I am grateful for the cards I was dealt.

[gremlin]

Not always the case, some of mums kids had really bad homes, she was very strict they respected her for it. Quite a few have gone on to good jobs, one of the worst families who the rest of the estate were terrified of, have turned out a complete house building team. They have said that if it hadn't been for mums iron rule, they would have been in prison. Admittedly some have ended up in jail, and since she left, that percentage has risen.
The bling culture has alot to answer for. We didn't have two pennies to rub together when I was a kid, nor did I when my daughter was a kid, unfortunately she has bought into the bling thing, I still make do and mend, so home attitudes don't necessarily create the monster, outside influences can unfortunately. She was taught thrift but it fell on deaf ears, now she has gone back to work because she and her partner can't survive on more money than we have a month, but they have to have the latest of everything, so does my grand daughter, I dread to think what will happen in the future.
This acquisitive society has done more damage than anything, unfortunately there isn't the discipline to work for what you want and save up, hence the muggings when someone has the latest phone or whatever.

[Moley]

Good to see you are still stiring the old emotions Nonnie.

[gremlin]

Yup and I think we've all gone off on our own tangents! Driver attitiude, well I must admit I turn into a raging whatever behind the wheel. I'll walk away from most things but put me in a car or on a bike and have someone cut me up, all hell breaks loose! I won't chase them cos it's a waste of petrol but my language is far from ladylike. My stepdaughter told me that Clive referred to me as a lunatic, and after taking her to roller skating she told me he was right. I was really good until a mimser nearly took my wing off at a roundabout, then twice cut in front along a dual carriageway, and then a van decided to bully me on a filter and I have to hang my head in shame and admit he got the finger. I don't know why there is this aggression cos I'm as far from an aggressive person as you can get.

[Chris & Nean]

My personal experience also supports this - I have two kids who have had the same upbringing but are both so totally different in character that it could only be explained by genetics - one so obviously inherited her behaviour characteristics from my family and the other from my wife's family.

Are you still married Will? thats asking for it above for sure if u r m8

[gremlin]

I guess there will always be bad apples, some of the worst criminals have had loving families and all they could have wished for, others have had terrible home lives, so I guess there must be something in their make up that makes them bad. No doubt there will soon be a test to find out which gene it is that maybe causes it and children who have this quirk will be reprogrammed!

[slob]

...If your knuckle dragging, wife beating slob and his other half are the only role models a child has...

That's slanderous, I'll deal with you as soon as I've contacted my lawyer...

[nik_the_brief]

That's slanderous, I'll deal with you as soon as I've contacted my lawyer...


You called Rob :biggrin:

[Will]

Well if everyone thought that was completely true, we could just stop any training programes, therapy of any sort and just give up, as no-ones got any capacity to change them ? Don't you believe you've been able to learn anything? Despite your characteristics? Surely your characteristics just effect how you can can learn?

We can all learn stuff - but we do not have the ability to change our basic, pre-determined character traits.

[benson]

Hello all, now I have finished throwing up in my sink, I have come online to tell you that Nonnie is right in all that she has said. I have been in education for many years and seen many children emulating their parents attitude at many things so therefore I rest Nonnies case,

p.s. ffs rachel, put a password on your pc and don't go to bed before Nonnie. EVER!!!

[benson]

While we're hijacking others' logins(on account of their incapacity) this seems to be a good exmple of 'nurture'
http://www.ukmonster.co.uk/monster/attachment.php?attachmentid=10512&d=1174787436
(hacker-slob)

[benson]

Incapacity benefit I say - it's mine ALL MINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!