NCRM Placement Fellowship: Improving young driver safety

Placement organisation: Department for Transport
Researcher: Damian Poulter, University of Greenwich
Placement duration: September 2017 - June 2018

Young drivers are four times more likely to be killed or seriously injured than those aged 25 years or above, and the Department for Transport (DfT) is developing evidence-based policies on young driver safety. The NCRM placement fellowship involves Dr Damian Poulter working as an expert advisor for the DfT on a forthcoming large-scale trial, Driver2020, designed to inform practice and policy on the safety and skill of novice drivers on British roads. His role is to provide an in-depth review of the proposed methodologies to be used in the Driver2020 trial, and he will continue to advise the DfT throughout the course of the project as a peer reviewer.

The Driver2020 project is a three-year project which will involve a detailed examination of learning to drive and early post-test driving. It will identify those training, education and technology-based approaches that give the greatest benefits to young newly qualified drivers in terms of their safety, skill and confidence. Over the three years of the project, feedback will be gathered from over 14,000 young people, in what is a world-leading piece of research.