Regulatory and legislative approaches to prevention of motor vehicle injury and related mortality in U.S. teenagers

Teenage drivers contribute disproportionately to motor vehicle crashes in the United States accounting for 5% of drivers and 20% of crashes. An estimated 40% of all deaths in teens aged 15-19 years are due to MV traffic crashes. In an effort to improve road safety among U.S. teenagers, many states have implemented legislation that grants full driver licensing privileges in incremental stages with permutations of age limits, adult supervision, mandatory driver's education, night-time driving restrictions, teenage passenger restrictions and others. The driving laws, known as graduated driver licensing or GDL laws, have been shown to be effective in reducing teen MV injury and mortality, but their effectiveness is not uniform. This presentation will demonstrate that the all-age context in which GDL is implemented, such as speed limits and select underage alcohol policies, significantly impacts teen driver injury independent of GDL laws.