Driving and riding avoidance following motor vehicle crashes in a non-clinical sample: psychometric properties of a new measure

Three studies were conducted to assess the reliability and validity of a measure that we developed using a non-clinical sample of university undergraduates, the Driving and Riding Avoidance Scale (DRAS). Study 1 indicated that the scale was internally consistent (alpha = 0.92) and that a four-factor model (general avoidance, avoidance of traffic and busy roads, avoidance of weather or darkness, and riding avoidance) provided the best fit to the data in a sample of 386 crash survivors. This study also revealed that survivors who received medical treatment for their crash-related injuries reported significantly greater avoidance than people who were uninjured or injured and not medically treated. Study 2 revealed that the DRAS possessed acceptable test-retest reliability (r = 0.83) over a 4-week interval in a sample of 67 crash survivors. Using a sample of 118 survivors, study 3 examined the instrument's convergent and divergent validity through correlations with the Accident Fear Questionnaire (AFQ), the Mobility Inventory (MI), the Fear Survey Schedule-II (FSS-II), and the Fear Questionnaire (FQ). The strongest relationships were observed between the DRAS and the AFQ and with a driving subscale created from the MI items. The DRAS exhibited significantly weaker relationships with the FQ subscales that assessed other kinds of phobic avoidance. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.