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Atlanta Constitution, Thursday, October 2, 1997
Forecast of teen wrecks: Cherokee High students take test designed to predict how they'll drive By Mark Bixler
A psychologist who says he can predict someone's chances of having a car wreck asked a Cherokee High School student Wednesday whether the accident he had about a year ago was serious.
The answer drew laughter from the class.
"Neither one of them was," the student said.
It was the light moment in a somber discussion about the dangers teenagers face when they climb behind the wheel. About 50 students at Cherokee High took a test Wednesday to find out how likely they are to wind up in a wreck.
Michael Cantor, and experimental psychologist who is president of WayPoint Research, Inc., designed the test. MARTA uses the test to screen prospective drivers. So does a trucking company in Columbus.
Cantor talked to students in Cherokee High's driver's ed class, where posters give tips on recovering from a skid, and crash test dummies remind students to buckle up.
he gave students a test booklet and instructed them to connect letters to numbers as quickly as possible. The results, which Cantor will mail to students, will tell teens what weaknesses they might have. Parents and teachers can use the results to aid teenagers' driving skills, he said.
Students at a few schools in Cobb County, DeKalb County and Atlanta will take the test in the next few weeks. Students across might take the test in the next few years, said Royce John Morris, the director of the Teen Driver Safety Council.
While Morris supports efforts to curb drunken driving, he says only 20 percent of teenagers killed on Georgia roads die because of alcohol-related accidents. He said 50 percent of fatal wrecks involving teenagers happen because of an error made by a teenage driver.
That's where Cantor comes in.
His test calls attention to the fact teens can prevent wrecks by matching their driving skills with their decision-making ability.
"I think a big part of it is that teenagers process information very fast and they think they can drive fast," Cantor said. "That's where you get into trouble."
Susan Padgett-Harrison, the principal of Cherokee High School, welcomed Cantor. She has logged 15 years at the school and said she sees too many teens die in auto wrecks.
"I bury one a year," she said.
Padgett-Harrison said many teens are not ready to drive.
"They think they're immortal," she said. "They're too immature to drive."
Y. J. Thompson, an 18-year-old junior who took Cantor's test Wednesday, agree. He has been driving for a little more than two years and has had one wreck. He said he ran into a car that had stopped in front of him.
He said some of this classmates are not model drivers.
"I guess some of them aren't ready to be turned loose," he said.
Ryan Taylor, a 16-year old junior who sat next to Thompson, said he has accidentally driven into two poles since he started driving. He said he a many teenagers are tempted to drive faster when friends are in the car.
Cantor said that can be a recipe for disaster. He said teenagers make up 7 percent of the country's population but account for 14 percent of traffic fatalities. He said teenagers are involved in 20 percent of all wrecks.
"So what does that mean?" he asked students rhetorically. "Slow down!"
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