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Road Rage Disorder

STUDY: 16 MILLION MIGHT HAVE ROAD RAGE DISORDER

To you, that angry, horn-blasting tailgater is suffering from road rage. But doctors have another name for it -- intermittent explosive disorder -- and a new study suggests it is far more common than they realized, affecting up to 16 million Americans.
Ref. https://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/06/05/road....e.ap/index.html

Disorder Rage Road

While it is frightening that so many people in the US are afflicted with this disorder, the number is actually quite believable. I witness 'road rage' on almost a daily basis, and I live in a city of 90,000. In larger cities, the proportions are much higher because of busier roads, longer commutes and the obvious reason, higher populations. I can honestly say I have had bouts of 'road rage' but not consistently, and the episodes were short-lived. I think everyone at some stage during driving, will experience an 'episode', but for these 16 million folks, I suspect they have consistent and extended issues with rage.

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I really have to question this, another ridiculous "disorder"? Hello! Its called losing your temper! Control it and this doesn't happen, and calm people who control their tempers don't normally exhibit road rage at all. Putting a disorder tag on it validates the behavior as not their fault, which is just not true. I really hate it when the medical community insists on creating a medical reason for everything. Why can't road rage be called what it really is, irresponsible people who cannot control themselves and act like children on a play ground when something happens on the road that they don't like! Disorder indeed!

Disorder Rage Road

That was my first knee jerk reaction as well then I began looking at this a little more.

The States define it as:

A social Condition where motorists lose their temper in reaction to a traffic disturbance.

In Canada we call it losing your temper as you stated. Though I think this will change as they people need some serious help!


Canada's population is 3 million approximately and of that 13 million live in Ontario mostly in the Greater Toronto Area. Guess where the road rage is rampant?

3 people a day die in auto accident in Ontario, one person every 6 minutes are injured. 9 billion is spent annually on the cost of collisions and every day 12 000 licenses are issued (This includes upgrades and such as well).

We have a lot of people driving on a road that was not built for this volume result slow moving traffic.


But why label it a disorder? One some doctors will make some big money on the research and proposal to cure it. Two it is a social issue not just a personal one, just like wife beating.

It is not just a handful blowing their tops. It is increasing in occurrence but why?

Well here is my thought why it is being labeled a disorder.


Look at people 30 years ago. Had a land line and used it for mostly emergency or to call and see if some one was home before driving a long distance to visit. Most likely spent days with out using it.

Students researching a topic where off to the library read volumes of books to find what was needed it took a long time. One could drive from Niagara Falls to Toronto in one hour to visit a friend no mater what time of day it was. Life had an easy pace if it was not done today every one realized thing can take time to complete.

Back to the present.

We can be contacted in our own bed no matter where we are if we pick up our cell phone. Hubby driving home from work wife can call and ask him to get bread no waiting on tomorrow or even till he gets home.

A student walks down his stairs to the computer ad in minutes has volumes of information and in hours it placed in a document and printed off that would have taken me days in grade school!

Like to watch a movie hit a button on the television no waiting till Saturday night to go to a theater.

Everything in life is speeding up zoom zoom zoom, well almost everything. lets look at the drive from Niagara falls that was an hour at any time. Now it could be two or three hours moving at a snails pace because every one is going home or heading to work.

So in a society where all is speeding up our travel time is slowing down resulting in a large increase in stress levels. At home we have our children involved in many sports or after school activities time we do not have to spare. again increasing this stress level.

On top we have a generation now raised on violent video games. They watch movies where this occurs on a regular biases. So we as a society by letting them watch this stuff we are telling them it is ok to act violently.

So id society is say it is ok and our societies expected lifestyle is creating the stress then I guess that definition does fit for Road Rage.

Real question is how to stop it.

Time stress causes tailgating which results in spectacular accidents 50 or 20 cars piled up. Why because it takes us two seconds to stop a car safely but we are .5 seconds behind the car in front. Believe it or not this in turn at 120 kPh is over 400 ft in distance! Next time you are out count how many cars are in a 400 ft section and keep in mind they can not stop before hitting the car in front in an emergency.

This is a serious issue and does need to be dealt with.

Disorder Rage Road

Yes I think road rage is something that can be controlled or dealt with. All people have to do is slow down in their lives and not let things get to them. I know that is very hard as people try to pack more and more things to do in a already filled time table. We as a society need to stop rushing all over the place and smell the flowers growing along the walkway. Maybe then and only then will we see less and less or this disorder they call road rage.

I agree that it should not be called a disorder but people who can not control their tempers.

Road Rage Disorder

Yeah found it. Well the reason that it maybe called a disorder too is that sometimes people who are normally quite civil will have instances of road rage. I have also seen people who doesn't seem to react whatsoever to bad drives and so forth. Me personally I have some anger issues, so I use to swear a lot, one upping the bad drive (returning the favor to say just one step further) and so forth. Now I have a wife and son, so my reactions go from grumbling to myself, amusement to pretending that it didn't happen. I guess it depends on the mood of the person too. Psychologists agree though 'bottling up' of your rage is unhealthy, it will sometimes lead to explosive reactions. All in all I agree with you Krakyn, our life has taken a rather quick pace and the traffic on the roads forces us to slow down. Not everyone likes to slow down and it also humbles us in that there is nothing you can do about it. People like to believe that they can control everything about their lives. The longs lines on the roads brings us back to the reality that there are somethings you cannot. By calling it a disorder rather than simple road rage we are finding an excuse for our undesirable behavior or maybe they want to treat it like another anger issue and charge us by the hour for it.

If there is some person who can explain to me though why I should not get angry at the person who just zooms down the shoulder of the highway passings dozens of cars in seconds rather that waiting in line for hours like everyone else, then I am all ears.

Edited: lordryoko on 4th Oct, 2008 - 4:11am

Road Rage Disorder

According to the DSM-IV TR

Intermittent Explosive Disorder is characterized by discrete episodes of failure to resist agressive impulses resulting in serious assaults or destruction of property. It is considered an impulse control disorder.

An example of Serious assaultive acts would be striking another person or otherwise hurting another person or verbally threatening to physically assault another person. Destruction of property would entail purposely damaging or destroying an object of value. The degree of aggressiveness expressed has to be grossly out of proportion to any provocaiton or precipitating psychosocial stressor.

A diagnosis of intermittent explosive disorder should only be made after ruling out any other mental disorders that might account for the episodes of agression. (there are many that would fall into this category). You also have to rule out any phsyiological effects of substance abuse and/or general medical conditions (head trauma, Alzheimers, etc.).

Regardless, most of the other disorders which would explain this type of behavior are Axis II disorders. They are behavioral in nature and indicate inherent character flaws. They require behavioral modification treatment. And success is often limited. There are medications one can take but basically it comes down to learning to redirect their anger in a more appropriate manner.

Normal road rage would not justify a diagnosis of this disorder. It is the extreme cases that would qualify. The rest of us need to get a grip and learn some self-control.

Edited: alskann on 5th Oct, 2008 - 9:02am

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WoW that was very interesting alskann. I am always fighting to get a grip on emotions but thought his is normal for most people. I also find it gets easier with practice. I find just saying out loud as I see it coming that I forgive the person helps keep perspective and not hold it in.

Just yesterday a girls was looking to closely at her cell phone and I was glad I seen her early and avoided a collision. I just hope for as much grace when I am the one that messes up.