Concerns of Adult Children about their Parents Driving

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• Concerns of Adult Children about their Parents
  Driving
• Lidia P. Kostyniuk, Ph.D., P.E.
• M-CASTL
• Transportation Research and Education Conference
• April 7, 2009

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Background and Study Objective

• Background
• Driving important for independence , quality of
  life ability to drive safely declines with age
• Adult children can help parents make decisions
  about self regulation and transition to not
  driving
• Focus group studies suggest discussions about
  driving with aging parents are difficult
• Study Objective
• Examine concerns raised by adult children about
  parents driving
• Determine extent to which concerns are related to
  declines in driving

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Data and Sample

• Michigan statewide telephone survey
• cognitively unimpaired licensed drivers 65
  years
• who reported discussing their driving with adult
  children
• Sample
• N241
• age µ75.3, s5.8
• 57 female
• 52 lt high school education
• 95 lived in own homes
• 49 did volunteer work
• 13 worked for pay
• 92 Caucasian, 6 African American, 2 Other

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Methods

• Respondents were asked
• If they discussed their driving with adult
  children
• Did children express concern how, about what?
• Changes in driving
• Physical functioning and health
• Worry about safety while driving
• Comfort in various driving situations
• Willingness and comfort to drive to important
  appointment under adverse conditions rainy
  stormy weather, alternate route on freeway in
  heavy traffic, 200 mile trip in familiar and
  unfamiliar area
• Test for independence between childrens concern
  and respondent characteristics
• Estimate relative effects of respondent
  characteristics on probability of children
  expressing concern (binary logistic regression
  model)

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Definition

• Childrens concern - two levels
• Yes Children expressed concern about parents
  driving
• No Children did not express concern about
  parents driving in a general discussion about
  parents driving

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Results
34 of respondents reported children expressed
concern Concern expressed independent of age,
not independent of sex 53 of concern expressed
directly independent of age and sex
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Most frequently expressed concerns

• Driving long distances 19
• Getting too old to drive 15
• Driving at night 14
• Not paying attention 14
• Driving too fast 12
• Driving too slow 7
• Driving alone 7

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Childrens concern about parents driving
independent of

• Self-reported health
• Overall health, near vision, far vision, hearing
• Perceived risks and worries of
• Crash, personal safety and security, hurting
  someone, getting lost or confused
• Self-reported driving indicators
• Miles driven in last year, change in miles driven
  from five years ago, driving ability compared to
  that at age 50, pulled over by police in past
  year

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Childrens concern about parents driving
independent of

• Level of willingness to drive to important
  appointment
• On alternate route on freeway in heavy traffic
• On 200-mile trip in familiar area
• On 200-mile trip in unfamiliar area
• Level of comfort
• Making left turns, Driving at night, Backing up
• Driving in rainy stormy weather
• Driving on freeway in heavy traffic
• Driving on 200-mile trip in unfamiliar area

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Childrens concern about parents driving not
independent of

• Self-reported functioning
• Ability to walk ½ mile, Ability to climb 2
  flights of stairs
• Self-reported driving indicators
• Crashes in past 12 months
• Anticipation of problems with driving ability in
  5 years
• Level of comfort
• Driving 200 miles in familiar area
• Merging onto busy freeway
• Level of willingness to drive to important
  appointment
• In rainy stormy weather

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Binary Logistic Regression Model

• Started with all variables that were associated
  with childrens concern
• Some were correlated with each other
• Ability to walk ½ mile, ability to climb 2
  flights of stairs and anticipation of problem in
  driving ability in 5 years
• Comfort in merging onto freeway, comfort in
  driving alone for 200 miles in familiar area,
  willingness to drive in rainy stormy weather
• Model variables
• Crash in past 12 months
• Ability to climb 2 flights of stairs (3 levels)
• Comfort in merging onto busy freeway (3 levels)
• Gender

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Odds Ratios from Model

• Odds that children expressed concern about
  parents driving (OR, 95 confidence Interval)
• Crash vs. no crash in past year (3.8, 1.4-10.3)
• Uncomfortable vs. very comfortable merging onto
  busy freeway (3.2, 1.4-7.4)
• Male vs. female (2.5, 1.3-4.7)
• Not very able or not at all able to climb 2
  flights of stairs vs. able to climb 2 flights of
  stairs (2.1, 0.9-4.9)

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Findings

• Older drivers whose children expressed concern
  were
• 4 times more likely to be in a crash in the past
  year
• 3 times more likely to be uncomfortable merging
  onto a busy freeway
• 2 times less likely to be able to climb 2
  flights of stairs, or walk 2 blocks
• 2.5 times more likely to be male
• Not comfortable driving 200 mile trip in familiar
  area
• Likely to avoid driving in inclement weather

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Findings

• Little difference between drivers whose children
  expressed concern and those who did not on the
  following indicators.
• Overall health (also vision and hearing)
• Changes in amount of driving
• Changes in self-reported driving ability compared
  to their ability at age 50
• Comfort of driving at night, long trips in
  unfamiliar areas, making left turns, backing up

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Conclusions

• Discussions about driving between adult children
  and their parents are probably occurring later
  than they should be
• Indicators of problems are obvious and hard to
  ignore
• Direct discussion is difficult
• About ½ of concerns were expressed indirectly
• Easier to bring up topic of driving with mothers
  than fathers
• General discussions about driving more likely
  with mothers
• Concern discussions more likely with fathers
  other studies show men more reluctant than women
  to give up driving

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• Study strength relatively large representative
  sample of community dwelling Michigan drivers age
  65 and older
• Study limitation all data is from older
  drivers self report, including their health
  functioning, and childrens expressions of
  concerns.

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Next Steps

• Study with both aging drivers and their children
• to more objectively explore the family dynamics
  associated with driving self-regulation and
  transitioning to not driving.

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Thank youlidakost_at_umich.edu