Record details

• ISBN: 9780307264787
• ISBN: 0307264785
• ISBN: 9780307397720
• ISBN: 0307397726
• Physical Description: viii, 402 pages ; 24 cm
• Edition: 1st edition
• Publisher: New York ; A.A. Knopf Canada, 2008.

Content descriptions

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

Prologue: Why I Became a Late Merger (and Why You Should Too) 3 -- Chapter 1 Why Does the Other Lane Always Seem Faster? How Traffic Messes with Our Heads -- Shut Up, I Can't Hear You: Anonymity, Aggression, and the Problems of Communicating While Driving 19 -- Are You Lookin's at Me? Eye Contact, Stereotypes, and Social Interaction on the Road 27 -- Waiting in Line, Waiting in Traffic: Why the Other Lane Always Moves Faster 40 -- Postscript: And Now, the Secrets of Late Merging Revealed 45 -- Chapter 2 Why You're Not as Good a Driver as You Think You Are -- If Driving Is So Easy, Why Is It So Hard for a Robot? What Teaching Machines to Drive Teaches Us About Driving 51 -- How's My Driving? How the Hell Should I Know? Why Lack of Feedback Fails Us on the Road 57 -- Chapter 3 How Our Eyes and Minds Betray Us on the Road -- Keep Your Mind on the Road: Why It's So Hard to Pay Attention in Traffic 74 -- Objects in Traffic Are More Complicated Than They Appear: How Our Driving Eyes Deceive Us 89 -- Chapter 4 Why Ants Don't Get into Traffic Jams (and Humans Do): On Cooperation as a Cure for Congestion -- Meet the World's Best Commuter: What We Can Learn from Ants, Locusts, and Crickets 102 -- Playing God in Los Angeles 108 -- When Slower Is Faster, or How the Few Defeat the Many: Traffic Flow and Human Nature 119 -- Chapter 5 Why Women Cause More Congestion Than Men (and Other Secrets of Traffic) -- Who Are All These People? The Psychology of Commuting 131 -- Parking Problem: Why We Are Inefficient Parkers and How This Causes Congestion 142 -- Chapter 6 Why More Roads Lead to More Traffic (and What to Do About It) -- Selfish Commuter 153 -- A Few Mickey Mouse Solutions to the Traffic Problem 161 -- Chapter 7 When Dangerous Roads Are Safer -- Highway Conundrum: How Drivers Adapt to the Road They See 176 -- Trouble with Traffic Signs-and How Getting Rid of Them Can Make Things Better for Everyone 186 -- Forgiving Roads or Permissive Roads? The Fatal Flaws of Traffic Engineering 204 -- Chapter 8 How Traffic Explains the World: On Driving with a Local Accent -- "Good Brakes, Good Horn, Good Luck": Plunging into the Maelstrom of Delhi Traffic 211 -- Why New Yorkers Jaywalk (and Why They Don't in Copenhagen): Traffic as Culture 216 -- Danger: Corruption Ahead-the Secret Indicator of Crazy Traffic 231 -- Chapter 9 Why You Shouldn't Drive with a Beer-Drinking Divorced Doctor Named Fred on Super Bowl Sunday in a Pickup Truck in Rural Montana: What's Risky on the Road and Why -- Semiconscious Fear: How We Misunderstand the Risks of the Road 244 -- Should I Stay or Should I Go? Why Risk on the Road Is So Complicated 248 -- Risks of Safety 262 -- Epilogue: Driving Lessons 277.

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Subject:

Automobile driving > Psychological aspects.
Traffic congestion.
Traffic engineering.
Commuting.