Teen automobile crash rates are higher when school starts earlier
Thursday, June 10, 2010 - 17:22
in Psychology & Sociology
In 2008 the teen crash rate was about 41 percent higher in Virginia Beach, Va., where high school classes began at 7:20 a.m., than in adjacent Chesapeake, Va., where classes started more than an hour later at 8:40 a.m. There were 65.4 automobile crashes for every 1,000 teen drivers in Virginia Beach, and 46.2 crashes for every 1,000 teen drivers in Chesapeake. The two adjoining cities have similar demographics, including racial composition and per capita income.