Automakers, marketers should nudge us more often to slow down on busy roads
Wentworth and Karen Maynard know the impact of speeding on the roads.
In 2015, a 19-year-old rear-ended Wentworth Maynard’s car on Tara Boulevard while traveling around 107 mph, according to court records. He suffered permanent brain damage, his attorney said, and the couple sued Snapchat and the young driver, alleging she was using the app’s since-discontinued speed filter, which clocked how fast users were going and allowed them to share that information with friends.
Just before this case was to finally go to trial, Snapchat agreed to settle the Maynards’ lawsuit, as the couple alleged the social media platform is liable for the serious injury crash. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Rosie Manins reported that the case churned in the judicial system’s gears for over a decade before reaching this denouement.
Snapchat, in a statement, said the case “was resolved in an amicable manner, pursuant to a confidential agreement, and no party admitted any liability.” The company has previously said it warned users not to drive while using the app, and it discontinued the speed filter in 2021 after concern that it encouraged dangerous driving, the AJC reported.
The driver entered a “no contest” guilty plea to a criminal charge of serious injury by vehicle, according to court records.
The broader question that needs examining here is this: Why does our society continue to encourage and normalize speeding?
The nudges are so numerous that people can miss them. Car commercials flex on the features of their respective models. And often somewhere in there is the vehicle’s ability to launch from 0 to 60 in a certain amount of time or boasts about how the vehicle gets an extra kick in a certain sport mode.
But for what practical purpose do these features really serve, except for quickly accelerating onto a freeway? Study after study shows that increasing speed decreases safety on the roads. Reaction time is less. Control is less. And the impacts are harder.
Speed, however, has been normalized for decades on American roads. Muscle cars stood out in the later part of the 20th century. Commercials and movies glamorize holding a throttle wide-open on the public roads.
Our giant country has sprawled out far and wide, and our individualism is a huge feature of what makes America. Freedom and independence are woven into the idea of the automobile.
But that same autonomy can be a flaw and speeding grows out of that. When we make a trip solely about us, then the needs, presence and safety of others can fade. When the road becomes our runway to freedom, then our needs come first.
The roads are actually a utility that our collective taxes fund. And our cars are first and foremost tools to get us from point to point. They are not toys.
But vehicles became that way because of the slow boil of programming we have gotten from media and marketing. Messaging matters.
The book “Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness” discusses this phenomenon. The professors that authored it play out scenarios where simple changes in messaging can nudge people into better behavior. Examples include the placement of certain items in a lunch line or the wording and logistics of an employer-provided savings plan. Small, low-cost adjustments can really change behavior for the betterment of individuals and society.
A recent Smart Growth America study found that pedestrian deaths have increased an astounding 72% since 2009 in the U.S. The nonprofit heavily emphasized road design as a main cause. Better road design does not always force behavior but nudges drivers and people on foot into safer decisions. For example, narrower lanes invite drivers to move more slowly.
While the sexiness and coolness of our cars cannot be overlooked — we do spend a long time in them and pay lots of money to drive them — automakers and marketers should reconsider how much they are encouraging their customers to use their tools as dangerous toys.
Doug Turnbull covers the traffic/transportation beat for WXIA-TV (11Alive) with Rachel Cox-Rosen. Their reports appear on the 11Alive Morning News from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. and on 11Alive.com. Email Doug at dturnbull@11alive.com. Subscribe to the weekly “Gridlock Guy” newsletter for the column here.