(Press-News.org) Bottom Line: A web-based program for teen drivers appears to improve driving performance and quality supervised practice time before teens are licensed.
Author: Jessica H. Mirman, Ph.D., of The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and colleagues.
Background: During the learner phase of driver education, most states have requirements for supervisors and practice content. However, parent supervisors can vary in their interest, ability and approach to driving supervision. Inexperience is a contributing factor in car crashes involving novice drivers.
How the Study Was Conducted: The authors conducted a clinical trial to examine whether the Teen Driving Plan (TDP) for parent supervisors and prelicensed teen drivers would result in more supervised driving in a range of environments and more teens capable of passing an on-road assessment. The TDP focuses on driving environments such as empty parking lots, suburban residential streets, one- and two-lane roads, highways, rural roads with curves and elevation changes, and commercial districts. The study involved 217 pairs of parents and teenagers with a learner's permit who either took part in the TDP intervention or received the Pennsylvania driver's manual (the control group). Teens received as much as $100 and parents as much as $80 for completing all study activities.
Results: Intervention participants reported more practice in all but one of the six driving environments and at night and in bad weather compared with the control group. Overall, 5 of 86 teens (6 percent) in the intervention had their on-road driving assessment ended because of poor performance compared with 10 of 65 teens (15 percent) in the control group.
Discussion: "This study demonstrates that supervised practice can be increased using an evidence-based behavioral intervention . … We estimate that for every 11 teenagers who use TDP, one additional teenager would be prevented from failing the tODA [Teen On-road Driving Assessment] for safety reasons."
(JAMA Pediatr. Published online June 23, 2014. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2014.252. Available pre-embargo to the media at http://media.jamanetwork.com.)
Editor's Note: The study was supported by State Farm. The funder provided financial and in-kind support for the development of the TDP. Please see article for additional information, including support, other authors, author contributions and affiliations, etc.
Editorial: Increasing Safe Teenaged Driving
In a related editorial, Corinne Peek-Asa, Ph.D., of the University of Iowa, Iowa City, and colleagues write: "Road traffic crashes, among the top 10 leading causes of death worldwide, are increasingly recognized as a public health priority."
"Research on innovative new methods for intervention delivery are needed, such as options for financial incentives through insurance programs, approaches for early identification and targeting of high-risk drivers, and programs that introduce a safe driving culture in early childhood. … Aiming to fill the gap in evidence-based parent-focused interventions, Mirman and colleagues evaluated the Teen Driving Plan (TDP) in this issue of JAMA Pediatrics," they continue.
"As the evidence base grows, translation and cost-effectiveness studies that examine the impact of crash risk in real-world settings are needed," they conclude.
(JAMA Pediatr. Published online June 23, 2014. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2014.582. Available pre-embargo to the media at http://media.jamanetwork.com.)
Editor's Note: Please see article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, etc.
Media Advisory: To contact author Jessica H. Mirman, Ph.D., call Dana Weidig at 267-426-6092 or email weidigd@email.chop.edu. To contact editorial author Corinne Peek-Asa, Ph.D., call William Barker at 319-384-4277 or email william-barker@uiowa.edu.
INFORMATION: END
Intervention appears to help teen drivers get more, better practice
2014-06-23
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Mammals defend against viruses differently than invertebrates
2014-06-23
Biologists have long wondered if mammals share the elegant system used by insects, bacteria and other invertebrates to defend against viral infection. Two back-to-back studies in the journal Science last year said the answer is yes, but a study just published in Cell Reports by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai found the opposite.
In the Mount Sinai study, the results found that the defense system used by invertebrates — RNA interferences or RNAi — is not used by mammals as some had argued. RNAi are small molecules that attach to molecular scissors ...
Many ER patients test positive for HIV while in most infectious stage
2014-06-23
WASHINGTON — Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) screening for emergency patients at an institution with a large number of ethnic minority, underinsured and uninsured people reveals few are HIV positive, but of those who are, nearly one-quarter are in the acute phase and more than one-quarter have infections that have already advanced to Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). The results of the study were reported online yesterday in Annals of Emergency Medicine ("Identification of Acute HIV Infection Using Fourth Generation Testing in an Opt-Out Emergency Department ...
Fatal cellular malfunction identified in Huntington's disease
2014-06-23
Researchers believe they have learned how mutations in the gene that causes Huntington's disease kill brain cells, a finding that could open new opportunities for treating the fatal disorder. Scientists first linked the gene to the inherited disease more than 20 years ago.
Huntington's disease affects five to seven people out of every 100,000. Symptoms, which typically begin in middle age, include involuntary jerking movements, disrupted coordination and cognitive problems such as dementia. Drugs cannot slow or stop the progressive decline caused by the disorder, which ...
Cocoa extract may counter specific mechanisms of Alzheimer's disease
2014-06-23
(NEW YORK – June 23) A specific preparation of cocoa-extract called Lavado may reduce damage to nerve pathways seen in Alzheimer's disease patients' brains long before they develop symptoms, according to a study conducted at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published June 20 in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease (JAD).
Specifically, the study results, using mice genetically engineered to mimic Alzheimer's disease, suggest that Lavado cocoa extract prevents the protein β-amyloid- (Aβ) from gradually forming sticky clumps in the brain, which ...
'Tom Sawyer' regulatory protein initiates gene transcription in a hit-and-run mechanism
2014-06-23
A team of genome scientists has identified a "hit-and-run" mechanism that allows regulatory proteins in the nucleus to adopt a "Tom Sawyer" behavior when it comes to the work of initiating gene activation.
Their research, which appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, focuses on transcription factors—proteins that orchestrate the flow of genetic information from DNA to messenger RNA (mRNA). Their results show how transcription factors (TFs) activate mRNA synthesis of a gene, and leave the scene – in a model termed "hit-and-run" transcription.
"Much ...
Treading into a gray area along the spectrum of wood decay fungi
2014-06-23
One of the most basic rules for playing the game "Twenty Questions" is that all of the questions must be definitively answered by either "yes" or "no." The exchange of information allows the players to correctly guess the item in question.
Fungal researchers have been using a variation of Twenty Questions to determine if wood-decaying fungi fall under one of two general classes. If a fungus can break down all the components – cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin – of plant cell walls it is considered a white rot fungus. If a fungus can only break down cellulose and hemicellulose ...
Emergence of bacterial vortex explained
2014-06-23
VIDEO:
When confined in a water droplet, B. subtilis bacteria collectively and spontaneously form a swirling vortex, with some bacteria moving in one direction and others moving the opposite way. Researchers...
Click here for more information.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — When a bunch of B. subtilis bacteria are confined within a droplet of water, a very strange thing happens. The chaotic motion of all those individual swimmers spontaneously organizes into a swirling ...
Straw albedo mitigates extreme heat
2014-06-23
Wheat fields are often tilled immediately after the crop is harvested, removing the light-coloured stubble and crop residues from the soil surface and bringing dark bare earth to the top. Post-harvest tilling is a widely practised and common management technique in Europe. However, ploughed fields can have a negative effect on the local climate during a heat wave. This effect was addressed in a recent study conducted by researchers at ETH Zurich led by Edouard Davin, senior lecturer at the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, and Sonia Seneviratne, professor of ...
Vaccine made from complex of two malaria proteins protects mice from lethal infection
2014-06-23
WHAT:
An experimental vaccine designed to spur production of antibodies against a key malaria parasite protein, AMA1, was developed more than decade ago by scientists from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health. It showed promise in test-tube and animal experiments and in early-stage clinical trials, but returned disappointing results in recent human trials conducted in malaria-endemic countries.
Now, the NIAID scientists have improved on their original vaccine with a new candidate that delivers AMA1 ...
Rett syndrome drug shows promise in clinical trial
2014-06-23
CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Rett syndrome, a rare genetic disorder that causes mental retardation, autism, and physical deformities, has no cure. However, a small clinical trial has found that a growth factor known as IGF1 can help treat some symptoms of the disease.
Children who received the drug for four weeks showed improvements in mood and anxiety, as well as easier breathing, in a trial led by researchers at Boston Children's Hospital. MIT scientists first identified IGF1 as a possible treatment for Rett syndrome in 2009.
"This trial shows that IGF1 is safe in the cohort ...