in the car, “everything contributes to the other no longer existing”, explains a psychologist to “Envoyé Spécial”

A motorist who runs over a cyclist because he is late for an eye doctor appointment, drivers who hit others… Why such an explosion of violence in city centers and on the roads campaigns? Not a week goes by without a new case of a motorist who “goes crazy”… As for the names of birds flying behind the wheels, they would be the work of 67% of drivers, according to the latest VINCI Autoroutes barometer. Why do cars drive us crazy? “Special Envoy” asked the question to a psychologist.

Jean-Pascal Assailly has been studying these increasingly stressed drivers for around thirty years. According to him, in the passenger compartment, many of us are transformed. And even people ““very cautious about their cholesterol or their bank account will do anything while driving, because it's the small area of ​​their life where they let themselves go.”

The car is a bubble that isolates us and, by allowing us a form of anonymity, disinhibits us. As on social networks, we would be more inclined to aggressiveness. This is because, according to the psychologist, “t“all contributes to the fact that the outside world, and therefore the other, no longer exists.” In the car, you can insult your neighbor in line without giving him that look which allows you to “defuse the escalation of violence”.

In Paris, “Special Envoy” observed it again in the congested areas around the Place de la Bastille: driving seems to have become a source of permanent frustration. And some people have a hard time accepting the development of cycle paths which force them to share the road with bicycles… Because it is another factor, “very animal”, which promotes road aggression: Jean-Pascal Assailly calls it “the battle for space”. “There is a very strong relationship between traffic density and aggressiveness and attacks.”

As for the driver who sticks to you, honking his horn if you don't clear the way quickly enough, the psychologist translates his behavior like this: “This roll of bitumen, there, which is in front, it is not yours, it is mine. So you get out.”

Excerpt from “Are cars driving us crazy?”, a report to watch in “Special Envoy” on November 28, 2024.

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