Drinking And Driving Social Learning Theory

Drink driving & The social learning theory

Drink driving in the U.K is on the rise, with many people breaking the legal limit of drink driving daily. The current legal limit in England and Wales is 80 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood, 35 micrograms per 100 millilitres of breath or 107 milligrams per 100 millilitres of urine. (www.telegraph.co.uk) If a driver gives a specimen of any form which gives a reading that is higher than the limit provided above, they have in fact broken the law and could face prosecution. On average 3000 people are killed or seriously injured each year due to drink driving collisions. (www.drinkdrivingfacts.com) Drink driving plays a big part in deaths on the road as many as 1 in 6 of all road deaths
involve drivers who are over the limit. (www.drinkdrivingfacts.com) The theory chosen to explain why drink driving is as common as it is would be the social learning theory. Social learning theory consists of two types of conditioning there is classical conditioning which was first described by Ivan Pavlov, whose idea focusses on involuntary, automatic behaviours. This form of conditioning involves pairing a previously neutral stimulus with an unconditioned stimulus, the famous example of Pavlov's dogs would help understand this form of conditioning. The second type of conditioning is operant conditioning which was first described by B. F. Skinner who focused on strengthening or weakening voluntary behaviours using either reinforcement or punishments. The key theorist that will be used to explain the relationship between the crime and the theory will be Albert Bandura who says we learn behaviour from family, friends and even our culture. Banduras bobo doll experiment allows us to see that people learn from positive and negative reinforcements which allow us to link behaviours to good and bad. Statistics show that More than 8000 people get caught drink driving twice in five years (www.theguardian.com). This allows us to see that once behaviour is learned it isn’t as easy to unlearn. However, learning behaviour is not something that only takes place as children. An example of how drink driving could be learned through the family at a young age could be by linking parent’s actions to emotions, for example if a child was to see a mother drink several times a week and the parent was a happy drunk, the child could link alcohol to happiness. If the parents were social people and constantly round a friend’s house having a drink socially and proceed to drive home the child who is unaware of legal limits, could then presume drink driving well (not causing an accident or are not pulled over) is acceptable. Therefor in the child’s eyes because parents have acted this way it is permitted for the child to also. ‘What they see at home helps children think about how they’ll drink alcohol as an adult. So, just as children learn to walk and talk like their parents, they learn how to drink like them too.’ (www.drinkaware.co.uk). As Bandura says behaviour can be learned by friends, for example an individual who is not alcohol dependant can also fall into breaking the law through drink driving, an example of this could be a group of friends drinking socially in a public house, all of which are over the limit several of which decide to drive home as they normally would. A person who is not under the influence of alcohol would think long term about the things that could go wrong due to reduced reaction times the alcohol would cause, therefor would not take the risk. However, a person who is in the situation with cloudy judgement would not pay attention to these details and would proceed to drive. In fact, they would more than likely have the attitude that if their friends have gotten away with drink driving they would also. People learn through observing others’ behaviour, attitudes, and outcomes of those behaviours (www.learning-theories.com). In my opinion addiction is another route to drink driving. As addictions progresses a healthy social circle may decrease as people who don’t have the same addiction (in the example alcohol) prefer to not be around people who are dependent on substances, this then causes the addict to invite people with the same addiction to the social circle, after a while the circle consists of people who entirely depend on alcohol. This can become dangerous to society as norms are no longer the same as an addict’s norms, e.g. a sober person with no addiction is aware that drink driving is legally and morally wrong, however the alcoholic becomes oblivious to the harm such actions could inflict. Thus, the alcoholic will follow what he/she sees the fellow circle do once drunk, this could be the action of driving while drunk. This could be another circumstance where ‘friends’ play a part in learned behaviour.

In my opinion the social learning theory does help define why people drink drive.
I believe that individuals sometimes pick up on the behaviours of those around us regardless of whether it was intentional. I do believe that if you have learned the idea that drinking and driving was acceptable through parents you may have been at a disadvantage as parents are normally the first relationships people have they are role models and I do believe that most social norms are taught to us by our parents, so by watching them breach the law it becomes slightly confusing to us as we grow. As children, we are punished for second guessing the actions of our parents therefore it is slightly contradictory to second guess their drink driving. I do feel however that there are more cons than pros when we apply this theory to this crime. Some of these cons include the fact that the theory does not explain why everyone who is under the influence of alcohol breaks social norms, e.g. not everyone drink drives. Another con would be that positive and negative reinforcements could vary by person to person e.g. a fine for drink driving could be enough to stop people drink driving again however others could see it as just a ‘slap on the wrist’ and continue to drink drive. I would also say that in my opinion two of the three route of learning behaviour can be reasons toward drink driving as discussed above. I don’t personally believe that culture is typically a route to encourage drink driving. The above paragraphs should give a clear insight to how behaviour is influenced by others thanks to the ideas of Albert
Bandura.