Men are better drivers than women. Fact or Myth?
MYTH!
I think, probably, this is one of the most debated questions in the history of human kind. Men and women are all curious about the differences between them, but in reality what they are curious about is: which sex is more capable? Men or women?
Last week N-Man said a typical male comment in a moment of anger. He empathizes with Saudis for not allowing women to drive! Naturally, I found the comment to be sexist. I tried to argue that this is a myth, but obviously the male ego is much larger than any logical arguments. Therefore, we started an experiment; while driving together we would count the number of weighty mistakes and check what the gender of the driver is.
We decided that we can only count violations that we see while we are in the same car, because each one of us was trying to prove a point. Also, N-man excluded taxi drivers, which is as a shame really, since taxi drivers are a great source to prove that men are not better drivers than women!
Now the count was 6 to 8. Women made more mistakes in the few hours we were together in the car… I am sure that another hour would have balanced the accounts.
However, this was not the point, even though I would like you to go through a similar process and count driving mistakes and let us know about the number of mistakes made by women vs. men.
Anyway
I think the end result was that women’s mistakes were very different from men’s. Men tend to drive more aggressively than women and display their aggression in a direct manner. I feel their aggression is related to either impatience or to showing off… They break the law, they take silly and unnecessary risks… Women on the other hand, I don’t know… my feeling is that they make mistakes because they lack knowledge in road rules or possibly lack of experience? I mean they hesitate, they flinch, they don’t respect priorities. I don’t know…
I also think that men are conditioned socially to be drivers… they grow up loving cars and fantasizing about driving them… on a different note, women sometimes use the myth that they are worse drivers as an excuse to get by or break the laws…
I asked several people about their ideas on women and men driving skills:
N-man, driving for 9 years, Amman
“men, because women lack motor skills”
Feras, driving for 17 years, Madaba
“men drive better, they have more technical skills.”
Abeer, driving for one year, Baqa’a
“Men, they know how to deal with the car better than women”
Hanan, driving for 10 years, Zarqa
“women, because they are more careful. Men tend to take more risks than women.”
Siham, driving for 2 years, Mafraq
“women, for a simple reason, in Mafraq, people to tend to ignore the road rules and laws. Women are more careful because they tend to be more fearful than men, so they need to be more careful. Therefore better drivers.”
Samer, driving for one year, Amman
“It is men of course, and if there are more accidents or mistakes by men. It is because the number of male drivers is much much higher than women. So proportionally, the number is higher”
Rami, driving for 10 years, Amman
“1000000% men! As a matter of fact, I am one of those who find myself cursing the person who gave a woman her license! Women think they own the street, they are slow, they don’t respect the rules.. they don’t use flash or indicators. Men might do the same, but we know what we are doing… women on the other hand are just confused!”
I don’t like the term “Better” to describe things. Better in what? Speeding? Getting in accidents? Getting tickets? Parking? Maneuvering? Being careful? Being considerate?
Driving is a very complex procedure. It encompasses so many behavioral and technical abilities.
So for people who think one gender is better than the other, I think that’s completely baseless. But naturally, men do tend to take more risks (Not a good thing) while women appear to be more careful. Does this make one or the other better? I doubt it.
Men get more tickets, get in more accidents, speed more, defy the laws more. The list is huge.
At the end of the day, the better driver, is the one who gets safely to his home. Without hurting himself or anyone else.
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When you say it is a myth that means you think either that women drive better than men (which is sexist
) or that they equally drive at the same level. So, which one? 
I think the best way to find which gender drives better is to count number of accidents caused by men vs women. Taking care of course of the ratio of male vs female drivers.
One of the books that was America’s national bestseller is “Traffic: Why we drive the way we do and what it says about us.” The book is really very interesting read and all observations made by experiments and research. Let me quote something from the book:
“Men honk more than women (and men and women honk more at women)” So even women don’t trust female drivers. I didn’t finish reading the book yet but I don’t think it will come up with a conclusion who drives better
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Qwaider, If you say: “Men get more tickets, get in more accidents, speed more, defy the laws more. The list is huge. At the end of the day, the better driver, is the one who gets safely to his home. Without hurting himself or anyone else.”
…then it is clear that women are better drivers if the priority is safety.
Men will ALWAYS be better at parking, give them that.
I have found that men in Jordan just cannot bear to be bested by a woman, especially in a car. He will risk the life of everyone on the road to increase his ‘win’ by one car length. Men drive with their ego.
Jordanian women haven’t been at it long enough to get confident. Men easily intimidate them into slow, stupid, cautious moves.
Men have only been driving for two generations. I read a study in Mexico that said by the 3rd generation, the driving gets much better.
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Men handle cars better than women.
The vehicle is a machine that requires Strength,Tactics,and No emotions to operate..and so by instinct and human gender characteristics men win every time.
I also think that your “weighing mistakes” does not fully apply, what is a good driver? one who follows the rules? my grandma can follow the rules,but she can’t handle a car the way I do,whereas I break the rules all the time..who’s better?
Cars,motors and machines will always be a man thing,just as dresses,flower arrangements and hair styles will always be a womanly thing.
now if you’d step into the passenger seat Madas,can I take u mishwar?
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y’know, there’s a reason that car insurance costs more for men…
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y’know, there’s a reason that car insurance costs more for men..
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ma dal shee l wa7ad ye7keeh , so big thx 4 the entry, enrichin` comments too 4 sure
H.
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The answer is NONE (if we take the extremes of course)
I live in this stereotypical dilemma every day. I ride to work with a male colleague and whenever another driver does a mistake, this is his reaction:
1. If the other driver is a male, and depending on the size of the mistake, the reaction would range from: “Why are you in a hurry?!?”, “Stupid”, “Watch Out” to a curse
2. If the other driver is a female, and no matter what sort of mistake she does, the reaction is always: “They should ban women from driving”, cursing the guy “Who gave her the license”, “Driving problems are all due to women”
3. If the other driver is unidentifiable: IT MUST BE A WOMAN
I do not intend to generalize, but I never heard of a big accident that was caused by a female driver. I second Kinzi, guys do park better — though I’m sure I can beat most of them
So again, what defines better? reckless, professional driving or prudent hesitant one…
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FACT!
driving and eating :p
Madas give in to this even I, the feminist, admit this. Whenever there’s someone mja77esh bil share3 it’s a woman. It’s a talent, guys understand machines and estimate distances better ON AVERAGE.
However, on the more positive side (i think) women make more accidents than men but men’s accidents are deadly while women accidents are not too dangerous.
It’s ok madas, we have multitasking
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This is very interesting, especially seeing as my friend from Jordan is a man and does not drive. I am an American woman and have been driving since before I even had a license. Not only that, but I also know how to fix most of the problems with my own car.
In my opinion, it does not matter what your gender is. It matters if you’re patient, attentive to the world around you, familiar with traffic laws and also familiar (at least minimally) on how a car works.
If you’re impatient or unfamiliar with the rules, you will make mistakes regardless of gender.
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Madas Reply:
November 16th, 2011 at 14:19
Agreed. However, culture plays a role in brainwashing women into thinking that men are better drivers
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