Accident Analysis and Prevention 34 (2002) 333– 341

www.elsevier.com/locate/aap

The antilock braking system anomaly: a drinking driver problem?

David W. Harless *, George E. Hoffer
Department of Economics, Virginia Commonwealth Uni6ersity, Box 844000, Richmond, VA 23284, USA

Received 30 November 2000; received in revised form 19 February 2001; accepted 28 February 2001

Abstract

Antilock braking systems (ABS) have held promise for reducing the incidence of accidents because they reduce stopping times
on slippery surfaces and allow drivers to maintain steering control during emergency braking. Farmer et al. (Accident Anal.
Prevent. 29 (1997) 745) provide evidence that antilock brakes are beneficial to nonoccupants: a set of 1992 model General Motors
vehicles equipped with antilock brakes were involved in significantly fewer fatal crashes in which occupants of other vehicles,
pedestrians, or bicyclists were killed. But, perversely, the risk of death for occupants of vehicles equipped with antilock brakes
increased significantly after adoption. Farmer (Accident Anal. Prevent. 33 (2001) 361) updates the analysis for 1996– 1998 and
finds a significant attenuation in the ABS anomaly. Researchers have put forward two hypotheses to explain this antilock brake
anomaly: risk compensation and improper operation of antilock brake-equipped vehicles. We provide strong evidence for the
improper operation hypothesis by showing that the antilock brake anomaly is confined largely to drinking drivers. Further, we
show that the attenuation phenomenon occurs consistently after the first three to four years of vehicle service. © 2002 Elsevier
Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Antilock brakes; Alcohol use; Risk compensation

1. Introduction ments overall. These perverse effects were most evident

An important anomaly with the incorporation of
safety appliances into motor vehicles is the ineffective-
ness – and even perverse effects – of antilock braking
systems (ABS), particularly as measured by fatal crash
involvement. Analyses of insurance claims in the US
(Highway Loss Data Institute, 1994, 1995) showed no
change in claim frequency after a set of GM vehicles
adopted antilock brakes in 1992 despite engineering
studies showing antilock brakes resulted in much better
braking performance, especially on wet roads. Using
the same group of GM vehicles, Farmer et al. (1997)
found that adoption of ABS resulted in more 1993 –
1995 crashes resulting in the death of an ABS vehicle
occupant. Another group of vehicles that adopted an-
tilock brakes as early as 1985 were found to have been
involved in both more fatal crashes resulting in the
death of an ABS vehicle occupant and more involve-
* Corresponding author. Tel.: + 1-804-8287190; fax: +1-804-
8281719.
E-mail address: dwharles@vcu.edu (D.W. Harless).
in single-vehicle crashes. Updating the earlier paper
with 1996 –1998 data on the same two groups of vehi-
cles, Farmer (2001) finds that the ABS-equipped vehi-
cles no longer had a worse fatal accident involvement
rate.
The ABS anomaly has sparked a large program of
research at the National Highway Transportation
Safety Administration, the many components of which
are described by Garrott and Mazzae (1999). Several
explanations have been forwarded for the anomaly.
First, consistent with the risk compensation hypothesis,
the higher incidence of fatal crashes could be due to
increased speed and aggressiveness by drivers of ABS-
equipped vehicles (Evans, 1995; Evans and Gerrish,
1996). Second, there may be problems with improper
operation of ABS-equipped vehicles: the higher inci-
dence of single vehicle crashes could be due to abrupt
steering changes by panicked drivers inexperienced with
ABS reacting instinctively in emergency situations (Ka-
hane, 1994). With ordinary brakes, such steering
changes have no effect if the brakes are locked. The
subsequent attenuation of the ABS anomaly (Hertz et

0001-4575/02/$ - see front matter © 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 0 0 1 - 4 5 7 5 ( 0 1 ) 0 0 0 3 0 - 6
334 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
al., 1998, 2000; Farmer, 2001) may be due in part to
drivers accumulating more experience using antilock
brakes.1
In this paper we report strong evidence supporting
Kahane’s hypothesis that the ABS anomaly occurs
because of improper operation of antilock brakes. We
examine the sample of vehicle lines adopting ABS used
by Farmer et al. (1997) and Farmer (2001) and apply
the same risk ratio analysis to show that the perverse
effects of ABS are confined largely to drinking drivers.
We find dramatic differences between drinking and
sober drivers in the rate of fatal accidents in ABS-
equipped vehicles compared to control vehicles. For
example, in the sample of GM vehicles that adopted
ABS in 1992, consider the rate of fatal accident involve-
ments resulting in the death of an ABS vehicle occu-
pant in the years 1993– 1995: In the risk ratio analysis
we find that the number of such accidents involving
drinking drivers was 82% higher than expected (P=
1.6E −11). When there is an ABS problem (e.g., the
years 1993–1995 for the GM vehicle sample) there are
large differences between the risk ratios for drinking
and sober drivers; when there is no ABS problem (e.g.,
the years 1996–1998) the differences between drinking
and sober drivers disappear. We also show that the
attenuation of the ABS problem after the first four
years of vehicle service, as in Farmer (2001), was also
evident in the earlier group of vehicles which adopted
ABS as early as 1985.
2. Analysis of GM vehicles adopting antilock brakes in
1992
We follow Farmer et al. in comparing the fatal
accident involvement rates of ABS-equipped 1992 GM
vehicle lines (the first year that antilock brakes were
adopted as standard equipment in these vehicle lines) to
otherwise similar 1991 model-year vehicle lines. To
parallel Farmer et al. (1997) and Farmer (2001), Table
1 provides risk ratios for both 1993– 1995 fatal acci-
dents (left side) and 1996– 1998 fatal accidents (right
side).2
To demonstrate our (very close) replication of the
previous findings, the first line of the table shows our
results for all fatal accident involvements resulting in
the death of an ABS vehicle occupant. For example,
from the FARS files (National Highway Traffic Safety
1
Besides these two explanations for the ABS anomaly, Garrott and
Mazzae (1999) also mention the possibility of hardware or software
failures and poor performance in particular circumstances (e.g., wash-
board roads).
2
Farmer et al. omit the first year of service (1992) because of the
problem of getting a proper measure of vehicle exposure.
Administration, 1997) we observed 328 accidents in-
volving the selected ABS-equipped, 1992 model-year
GM vehicle lines during the years 1993–l995.3 Under a
null hypothesis of no change in such fatal accident
involvements upon adoption of ABS, we expect 273.7
such involvements given total vehicle registrations of
the 1992 model-year vehicle lines and the involvement
rate of 1991 model-year vehicle lines without ABS. The
resulting risk-ratio (= observed/expected) equals 1.20.
One can present a test of the null hypothesis of no
change in the rate of fatal accident involvement (i.e.,
that the risk ratio is not significantly different from 1.0)
either through a 95% confidence interval for the risk
ratio or a Chi-squared statistic (= (observed−ex-
pected)2/expected) with one degree of freedom (Breslow
and Day, 1987). As in Farmer et al. (1997), the number
of fatal accidents resulting in the death of an ABS
vehicle occupant is 20% higher than expected during
the 1993–1995 period (risk ratio= 1.20, X 2 =10.79,
P= 0.001). And as in Farmer (2001), the risk ratio is
not significantly different from one during the 1996–
1998 period (risk ratio= 0.95, X 2 = 0.97, P =0.32).
Bifurcation of these fatal accidents by whether the
driver of the vehicle was drinking alcohol has a tremen-
dous impact on the risk ratios for accidents occurring
from 1993 to 1995. Drinking drivers in ABS-equipped
vehicle lines have 82% more involvements resulting in
the death of an occupant of the ABS vehicle than
expected given vehicle exposures and the number of
drinking drivers involved in such fatal accidents in
pre-ABS vehicles (risk ratio= 1.82, P= l.6E− 11). But
for sober drivers the risk ratio, 0.99, is neither practi-
cally or statistically different from a risk ratio of one.
In contrast to the 1993–1995 period, bifurcation by
whether the driver was drinking makes little difference
during the 1996–1998 period. The risk ratio is 0.92 for
drinking drivers and 0.96 for sober drivers, neither
significantly different from one. Hence, when the ABS
anomaly is observed, the problem appears to be largely
confined to drinking drivers; when the ABS anomaly
disappears, so too do the dramatic differences in risk
ratios between drinking and sober drivers.4
A similar pattern exists in the analysis of all fatal
accident involvements. There are 64% more fatal acci-
dent involvements than expected for drinking drivers
during 1993 through 1995 (P= 4.4E− 9). During this
3
Farmer et al. report finding four more such accidents during the
1993 – 1995 period and one more such accident during the 1996 –1998
period. These very slight differences should have no impact on the
conclusions we draw.
4
We acknowledge that there is certainly error in the classification
of drinking drivers in the FARS files. But note that we compare only
the incidents of fatal crashes of drinking drivers in ABS vehicles and
the previous model-year non ABS vehicles (and similarly for drivers
not classified as drinking).
 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
Table 1
Risk-ratio analysis of GM vehicle lines adopting ABS in 1992

Fatal crashes occurring 1993–1995 (Years of service 2–4) Fatal crashes occurring 1996–1998 (Years of service 5–7)

95% Confidence interval 95% Confidence interval

2
Fatal crash type Observed Expected Risk ratio Lower Upper X Statistic P-value Observed Expected Risk ratio Lower Upper X 2 Statistic P-value

Resulting in death of ABS vehicle occupant 328 273.7 1.20 1.07 1.34 10.79 0.001 325 343.3 0.95 0.85 1.05 0.97 0.32
Driver drinking 124 68.3 1.82 1.51 2.16 45.44 1.6E−11 85 92.0 0.92 0.73 1.14 0.54 0.46
Not drinking 204 205.4 0.99 0.86 1.14 0.01 0.92 240 251.3 0.96 0.84 1.08 0.50 0.48
All involvements 479 468.0 1.02 0.93 1.12 0.26 0.61 487 524.4 0.93 0.85 1.02 2.27 0.13
Driver drinking 139 84.9 1.64 1.38 1.93 34.44 4.4E−9 99 107.7 0.92 0.75 1.12 0.70 0.40
Not drinking 340 383.1 0.89 0.80 0.99 4.85 0.03 388 413.7 0.94 0.85 1.04 1.60 0.20
All in6ol6ements by riskier dri6ers
Driver drinking 127 73.0 1.74 1.45 2.07 39.89 2.7E-10 86 90.2 0.95 0.76 1.18 0.19 0.66
Not drinking 184 217.8 0.84 0.73 0.98 5.26 0.02 226 244.2 0.93 0.81 1.05 1.36 0.24
Safer dri6ers
Not drinking 147 156.4 0.94 0.79 1.10 0.56 0.45 154 160.2 0.96 0.82 1.13 0.24 0.62
Dri6ers o6er age 65
Not drinking 60 50.7 1.18 0.90 1.52 1.72 0.19 66 57.1 1.16 0.89 1.47 1.39 0.24
Dri6ers age 65 and under
Not drinking 276 329.4 0.84 0.74 0.94 8.67 0.003 322 353.1 0.91 0.82 1.02 2.73 0.10

335
336 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
period, however, sober drivers have 11% fewer involve-
ments than expected (risk ratio=0.89, P= 0.03). Dur-
ing the years 1996–1998 neither drinking drivers nor
sober drivers have risk ratios significantly different
from one.
Curiously, we find that that this reduction in fatal
accident involvements for sober drivers occurs mainly
among riskier drivers. We divide drivers into riskier and
safer subsets based on seatbelt use, age, and driving
record in the three years prior to involvement in the
fatal accident. The riskier driver subset includes drivers
who did not use seatbelts, drivers age 25 and under,
and drivers who have shown themselves to be at greater
risk by having one or more previous DWI convictions,
suspensions, or other serious traffic violations, or two
or more previous accidents or speeding tickets. Evans
and Wasielewski (1983), Wasielewski (1984), and Jonah
(1986), among others, have demonstrated that young
(especially young male) drivers and drivers with a poor
driving record are much more likely to take greater
risks and drive more aggressively. The evidence on
selective recruitment (Evans, 1985) and seatbelts sup-
ports our selection of seatbelt use as a criterion to
identify the subset of safer drivers. Stewart (1993)
found that North Carolina drivers identified as seatbelt
nonusers in 1987 were much more likely to be involved
in an accident or to commit a traffic violation in the
subsequent three and one-half years. Stewart as well as
Evans (1996) provide evidence that nonusers tended to
be involved in more severe accidents (high speed
crashes, for example). Survey evidence indicates seatbelt
nonusers were much more likely than users to report
that they took more risks than other people (Preusser et
al., 1991) and that frequent or binge drinkers were
much more likely to be nonusers (Dee, 1998).5
Table 1 provides risk ratios for all fatal accident
involvements for drinking and sober riskier drivers and
for sober safer drivers. (There were very few cases
involving drinking safer drivers.) The differences are
again extreme during the years 1993– 1995: drinking
riskier drivers in ABS-equipped vehicles have 74% more
involvements than expected (P =2.7E − 10), but sober
riskier drivers in ABS-equipped vehicles have 16%
fewer fatal involvements (P = 0.02). This risk ratio for
sober riskier drivers, 0.84, is not only significantly
different from one (using the 5% significance level
criterion), but is also considerably smaller than the risk
ratio of 0.94 (P= 0.45) for sober safer drivers.
5
To define safer and riskier drivers we must have information on
driver age, seatbelt use, and previous record, but this data is some-
times missing in FARS. Hence, while we have 479 observed involve-
ments from 1993 to 1995, we have 468 involvements for safer and
riskier drivers with eleven observations excluded because information
on the driver’s previous record was missing.
We believe our evidence on the ABS anomaly and
drinking drivers should not be interpreted as support-
ing risk compensation. Risk compensation could mani-
fest itself in a greater willingness to drink and drive as,
under this hypothesis, drivers might believe the superior
braking performance of the ABS-equipped vehicle
could offset their own diminished driving ability. We do
observe many more fatal accidents involving drinking
drivers after ABS adoption, but we believe these drink-
ing drivers are observed because of difficulties operating
the ABS-equipped vehicle, not because more drivers
were willing to drink and drive on account of owning
an ABS-equipped vehicle. If risk compensation were the
explanation for the ABS-drinking driver interaction,
then we should also expect similar strong evidence of
risk compensation among sober drivers. To the con-
trary, sober riskier drivers of theses GM vehicle lines
are involved in 16% fewer fatal accidents than expected
(P= 0.02), while sober safer drivers show no significant
change in the rate of fatal accident involvements.
A question remains about what conclusions should
be drawn from the strikingly different results for ABS-
equipped vehicles in the years 1993– 1995 and 1996–
1998. Hertz et al. (2000) also report attenuation in the
ABS anomaly when they compare percentage changes
in the number of fatal crashes for ABS-equipped vehi-
cles during the period 1989–1993 and 1995–1996. For
example, Hertz et al. (1995) find that in the years
1989–1993 ABS-equipped passenger cars had statisti-
cally significant increases in fatal rollover and side-im-
pact crashes. Further, Hertz et al. (2000) perform a
similar analysis in the years 1995–1996 and find that
the increases for these accident types are only one-third
the magnitude of that in the earlier study and the
difference in fatal crash rates was no longer statistically
significant.
Farmer (2001) notes the difficulty of explaining defin-
itively this improvement, but he does suggest that me-
dia coverage of the ABS studies may have led drivers of
ABS-equipped vehicles to drive more cautiously, espe-
cially if some drivers were taking more risks because of
their overconfidence in antilock brakes. Hertz et al.
(1998) suggest that the attenuation of the ABS anomaly
may be due to improved skill in using antilock brakes
as drivers learn from experience. Both Hertz et al.
(2000) and Farmer (2001) see their more recent findings
as suggesting more positive prospects for antilock
brakes, especially as compared to the bleak prospects
suggested by their own earlier studies. We can add
insight to this puzzle by demonstrating that the dra-
matic change in results between 1993– 1995 and 1996–
1998 is much better explained by years of service for a
particular vehicle line than by calendar years. Indeed,
we show that the same pattern of attenuation in the
ABS anomaly is evident in the Farmer et al. (1997)
sample of other vehicle lines which adopted ABS as
early as 1985.
 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
3. Analysis of other vehicle lines
In addition to the GM vehicles adopting ABS in
1992, Farmer et al. (1997) and Farmer (2001) examine
a group of 26 ‘other vehicle lines’ which includes several
GM vehicle lines adopting ABS before 1992 and other
vehicle lines which adopted antilock brakes from the
1985 model year to the 1992 model year. This other set
of vehicle lines includes luxury and sports cars, three
station wagons, two GM minivans, as well as the
highest trim levels of two GM compact cars (2-door
and 4-door Pontiac Grand Am SE and Oldsmobile
Calais International Series). But the earlier risk ratio
analyses grouped vehicles over calendar years, mixing
different years of vehicle service. For example, Farmer
et al. (1997) analyzed accidents occurring from 1986 to
1995, mixing data for vehicles with as few as four years
of service with other vehicles with as many as 11 years
of service. We analyze the same set of vehicles, but
break with these earlier analyses by examining vehicles
in the second through fourth years of service and in the
fifth through seventh years of service. Consequently,
the sample of other vehicle lines are grouped by years
of service in the same way as the sample of GM
vehicles adopting ABS in 1992 were grouped in Table 1
where calendar years and years of service coincide.
Table 2 summarizes the results for the other vehicle
lines for years of service 2– 4 (left side) and years of
service 5–7 (right side). Note first that the same pattern
of attenuation holds here as occurred for GM vehicle
lines adopting ABS in 1992. There are 70% more fatal
accident involvements resulting in the death of an ABS-
vehicle occupant than expected in years of service 2–4
(risk ratio= 1.70, P= 2.6E − 11). In years of service
5–7, however, the risk ratio is far lower (0.88) but not
significantly different from one (P = 0.19). Similarly,
for all fatal accident involvements the risk ratio falls
from 1.28 (P= 2.2E −04) in years of service 2–4 to
1.00 (P= 0.97) in years of service 5– 7. Hence, the
attenuation of the ABS anomaly is related to years of
service rather than to calendar years. Indeed, although
the attenuation phenomenon was reported as a new
finding in Farmer (2001), the pattern was detectable, by
years of service, in the 1986– 1995 accident data used in
Farmer et al. (1997).6
Bifurcation by whether the driver of the vehicle was
drinking leads to conclusions similar to those drawn
from the evidence in Table 1, but with some notable
differences. First, just as with the GM vehicle lines
adopting ABS in 1992, the ABS anomaly appears only
in years of service 2– 4. When it appears there are
extreme differences in risk ratios for drinking and sober
6
That is, the same conclusions would be drawn if we considered
only the vehicle lines that adopted ABS from 1985 to 1989 so that at
least seven years of service were available.
337
drivers, and in years of service 5–7 when there is no
ABS anomaly, there are no important differences in
risk ratios for drinking and sober drivers. Second, in
years of service 2–4 there is again a striking difference
in risk ratios for fatal crashes resulting in the death of
an ABS vehicle occupant depending on whether the
driver is drinking (risk ratio= 2.25, P = 5.5E−12) or
not drinking (risk ratio= 1.42, P = 0.001). But here the
risk ratio for sober drivers is significantly greater than
one, in contrast to Table 1 where the risk ratio was
0.99. Third, when we analyze all involvements for
riskier and safer drivers, we again find highly elevated
risk ratios only for drinking riskier drivers (risk ratio=
2.32, P= 2.5E−12). For the GM vehicle lines adopting
ABS in 1992, sober riskier drivers had a risk ratio
significantly below one; here sober riskier drivers have a
risk ratio (1.05) that is not significantly different from
one and is far lower than that for drinking riskier
drivers.
We present Fig. 1 to further illustrate that the ABS
anomaly occurs for the first several years of vehicle
service. To construct Fig. 1 we calculated risk ratios for
all fatal accident involvements for drinking and sober
drivers by year of vehicle service, separating the sample
of GM vehicle lines adopting ABS in 1992 and the
sample of other vehicle lines. Fig. 1 shows clearly that
the elevated risk ratios occur for drinking drivers in
vehicles in the first three or four years of service; e.g., in
the calendar years through 1995 for vehicles adopting
ABS in the 1992 model year.7 For both sets of vehicles,
the risk ratios for sober drivers are near one, with the
risk ratio being significantly below one in the third year
of service for the sample of GM vehicles adopting ABS
in 1992.
Earlier we noted the importance of understanding
what conclusions to draw from the finding that the
ABS anomaly for 1992 model-year GM vehicles had
largely disappeared in the years 1996–1998. The evi-
dence in Table 2 and in Fig. 1 provides considerable
insight. Media coverage of the ABS problem can not
explain the post-1995 attenuation of the ABS anomaly
because the same attenuation phenomenon occurred for
vehicles adopting ABS as early as 1985. The informa-
tion does support the idea that the ABS anomaly is
related to driver inexperience with antilock brakes
(Hertz et al., 1998): the unexpectedly high number of
fatal accident involvements of ABS vehicles diminishes
with years of vehicle service. But there is likely also a
sample selection bias involved. One reason that the risk
ratios fall over time may be that a number of drivers
that are the most prone to driving while under the
7
Fig. 1 includes risk ratios as long as the expected number of
involvements exceeds 10. Thus the risk ratios for the other vehicle
lines stops at 10 years of service for drinking drivers and 11 years of
service for sober drivers.
 338
D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
Table 2
Risk-ratio analysis of other vehicle lines adopting ABS

Fatal crashes occurring in years of service 2–4 Fatal crashes occurring in years of service 5–7

95% Confidence interval 95% Confidence interval

2
Fatal crash type Observed Expected Risk ratio Lower Upper X Statistic P-value Observed Expected Risk ratio Lower Upper X 2 Statistic P-value

Resulting in death of ABS vehicle occupant 155 91.3 1.70 1.44 1.99 44.46 2.6E−11 107 121.3 0.88 0.72 1.07 1.68 0.19
Driver drinking 68 30.2 2.25 1.75 2.86 47.49 5.5E−12 44 55.9 0.79 0.57 1.06 2.54 0.11
Not drinking 87 61.1 1.42 1.14 1.76 10.94 0.001 63 65.4 0.96 0.74 1.23 0.09 0.77
All involvements 221 172.5 1.28 1.12 1.46 13.66 2.2E−04 200 199.4 1.00 0.87 1.15 0.00 0.97
Driver drinking 79 38.8 2.03 1.61 2.54 41.58 1.1E−10 52 60.6 0.86 0.64 1.13 1.21 0.27
Not drinking 142 133.6 1.06 0.89 1.25 0.52 0.47 148 138.8 1.07 0.90 1.25 0.60 0.44
All in6ol6ements by riskier dri6ers
Driver drinking 65 28.0 2.32 1.79 2.96 49.05 2.5E−12 44 47.2 0.93 0.68 1.25 0.22 0.64
Not drinking 74 70.4 1.05 0.83 1.32 0.19 0.67 72 73.1 0.98 0.77 1.24 0.02 0.89
Safer dri6ers
Not drinking 62 61.0 1.02 0.78 1.30 0.02 0.89 70 60.2 1.16 0.91 1.47 1.59 0.21
Dri6ers o6er age 65
Not drinking 18 16.1 1.12 0.66 1.77 0.22 0.64 17 17.0 1.00 0.58 1.60 0.00 1.00
Dri6ers age 65 and under
Not drinkink 122 117.5 1.04 0.86 1.24 0.17 0.68 128 120.6 1.06 0.89 1.26 0.46 0.50
 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
Fig. 1. Risk ratios plotted by years of vehicle service.
influence of alcohol and taking further risks (and then
operating the antilock brakes improperly in an emer-
gency situation) are no longer driving the sample vehi-
cles. Some are dead; others have had a serious accident
in a sample vehicle and are now in a different vehicle.8
4. Discussion
The information in Tables 1 and 2 demonstrates that
the ABS anomaly is largely a problem occurring among
drinking drivers, in particular, drinking riskier drivers.
Farmer et al. (1997) showed that the benefits of ABS
flow principally to ABS-vehicle nonoccupants; we show
that these accident reduction benefits occur mostly
among riskier drivers when they are not drinking. The
data do not point to the specific failures involved, but
the following explanation is consistent with the data:
Operating an ABS-equipped vehicle in an emergency
braking situation is quite different from operating a
vehicle with ordinary brakes. As Kahane (1994) points
out, panicked hard steering changes with locked brakes
have no effect, but are effectual with antilock brakes.
Since many drivers are unaware of the proper way to
use antilock brakes (Williams and Wells, 1994), it is
8
Changes in ownership might also play a role. The American
Automobile Manufacturers Association (1997) reports that 17% of
households keep their new vehicles less than three years.
339
plausible that most new ABS-vehicle drivers encounter
their first emergency braking situation without ever
having thought through the consequences of increased
steering responsiveness during braking of their ABS-
equipped vehicles.9 Instinct and/or old driving habits
are difficult to overcome; drivers of an ABS vehicle in
an emergency braking situation have to react to the
steering response of an ABS-equipped vehicle in frac-
tions of a second— and this steering response would be
much different than the response drivers experienced in
previous emergency braking situations in pre-ABS vehi-
cles. Drivers are in full command of their senses appear
better able to make this adjustment: For the GM
vehicles lines adopting ABS in 1992, the rate of fatal
crash involvements for sober drivers is significantly
lower with ABS and the rate of involvements resulting
in the death of an ABS vehicle occupant is no worse.
(But sober drivers in the other vehicle lines did have a
significantly higher rate of fatal accident involvements
resulting in the death of an ABS vehicle occupant.) But
when thought and reaction times are hindered by alco-
hol, many drivers may be unable to make these split-
second adjustments, especially if they have never
9
Depressing the brake pedal fast and hard is the wrong technique
for conventional brakes (where pumping the brakes is advised) but
the right technique for anti lock brakes. But the important difference
is that hard steering changes are ineffectual using the wrong tech-
nique with conventional brakes but (perhaps surprisingly) effectual
using the right technique with antilock brakes.
340 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
experienced an emergency braking situation with ABS.
Drinking drivers may also be more affected by the
noise of the antilock brake systems or pulsations felt
from pressure on the brake pedal. Note that the subset
of riskier drivers includes aggressive and/or careless
drivers who are more likely to be in a situation requir-
ing emergency braking. When these drivers are sober,
the antilock brakes are used to good effect and, for the
GM vehicle lines adopting ABS in 1992, decrease sig-
nificantly the fatality rate for nonoccupants. These
riskier drivers, however, are also much more likely to
drive while drinking and then suffer a strikingly higher
fatality rate in an ABS-equipped vehicle.
We acknowledge the speculative nature of our spe-
cific explanation concerning misoperation of ABS-
equipped vehicles by drinking drivers based on slower
reaction times and habit. But we can offer some further
support for this explanation. Among sober drivers,
drivers over age 65 would be expected to have the
slowest reaction times and be most likely to have
developed firm braking habits based on many years of
driving experience in pre-ABS vehicles. Hence, we look
for support for our reaction-time/habit explanation by
calculating the risk ratios for sober drivers over the age
of 65 and comparing these to sober drivers age 65 and
under. Note that that the tests of the hypotheses that
the two risk ratios for older drivers are equal to one
have little power since, as shown in the last rows of
Tables 1 and 2, the sample sizes are quite small. For
vehicle service years two through four there are only 60
observed involvements for GM vehicle lines adopting
ABS in 1992 and only 18 observed involvements for the
other vehicle lines. Nevertheless, comparing results for
sober drivers over 65 to results for other drivers, there
is evidence that the older drivers fare worse with ABS
vehicles than younger drivers. In Table 1 for 1993– 1995
fatal crash involvements the risk ratio for drivers over
age 65 is 1.18 which is not significantly different from
1.0. Yet this point estimate for the risk ratio is far
higher than the upper 95% confidence limit (0.94) for
drivers 65 and under. Hence, differences in risk ratios
by age group provide tentative support for our explana-
tion that the ABS anomaly is due largely to misopera-
tion of ABS-equipped vehicles by drinking drivers with
slower reaction times who are less able (perhaps in part
because of the force of habit) to make split-second
adjustments in steering and braking, especially in the
first several years of vehicle service when drivers have
little experience with using antilock brakes in an
emergency.
5. Conclusion
Researchers have suggested that the ABS anomaly
might be explained by the risk compensation (Evans,
1995; Evans and Gerrish, 1996) or by improper opera-
tion of ABS-equipped vehicles (Kahane, 1994). We find
evidence strongly supporting the latter. Specifically, we
show that the ABS anomaly is confined largely to
drinking riskier drivers. We apply the Farmer et al.
(1997) risk-ratio analysis and find that 1993–1995 fatal
crash involvements among drinking drivers in 1992
model year ABS-equipped GM vehicle lines are 64%
higher than expected based on exposures of the vehicle
lines and the number of drinking drivers in fatal acci-
dents in the pre-ABS versions of the vehicles. In the
same years we find that there is a significant reduction
in fatal crash involvements for sober drivers—11%
fewer fatal crash involvements for the later GM vehi-
cles. Similar conclusions hold for another set of vehicle
lines that adopted ABS as early as the 1985 model year;
we find sober drivers continue to have more fatal
accident involvements than expected (significantly more
involvements resulting in the death of an ABS vehicle
occupant) but there is again a striking difference be-
tween drinking and sober drivers.
Farmer (2001) and Hertz et al. (2000) suggest that
the prospects for antilock brakes are somewhat better
given the evidence of attenuation of the ABS anomaly.
For example, Farmer (2001) finds that the GM vehicle
lines adopting ABS in 1992 were no longer overin-
volved in fatal accidents resulting in the death of an
ABS vehicle occupant during the years 1996–1998. We
show that the ABS anomaly is related to years of
vehicle service, not calendar years: the attenuation ef-
fect is evident in the other set of vehicle lines that
adopted antilock brakes as early as 1985. We find that
drinking drivers in ABS-equipped vehicles have risk
ratios significantly greater than one for the first three to
four years of service, and then the risk ratios fall near
one. It is likely that the most important reason for this
phenomenon may be increased driver skill with ABS
after successive years of vehicle operation. But risk
ratios may also be lower because some drivers who are
most prone to taking further risks while driving under
the influence of alcohol are out of the sample after the
first four years of service: they are dead or no longer in
the sample vehicles having had already a serious acci-
dent in their ABS-equipped vehicle. We conclude that
the attenuation in the ABS anomaly reported by
Farmer (2001) and Hertz et al. (2000) should not lead
us to conclude that vehicles adopting ABS in years after
1992 were not subject to these same problems in the
first years of vehicle service.
We also find that the changes in fatal accident in-
volvement rates after ABS adoption occur mainly for
riskier drivers. Riskier drivers are also the most likely
to drink and drive and hence suffer a much higher
involvement rate in ABS-equipped vehicles, but sober
riskier drivers have significantly lower accident involve-
ment rates (to the benefit of ABS vehicle nonoccupants).
 D.W. Harless, G.E. Hoffer / Accident Analysis and Pre6ention 34 (2002) 333–341
We conjecture that drinking drivers incur these deadly
problems in ABS-equipped vehicles because of their
reaction times are dulled and perhaps also because of
greater adherence to old habits. Arguing that older
drivers are more likely to suffer these same problems,
we find support for our conjecture comparing risk
ratios for sober drivers over age 65 to younger drivers.
An immediate implication of our paper concerns the
design and implementation of new safety equipment.
Given the extraordinary influence of alcohol use on
traffic fatalities, should not active safety appliances be
designed and tested considering that the driver may
well use, perhaps for the first time, such equipment
while under the influence of alcohol? We find no indica-
tion that this question has been considered in the design
and implementation of antilock brake systems. Even
the most recent simulator and track tests (McGehee et
al., 2000), while emphasizing the importance of reaction
times, fail to consider the impact of alcohol use on
driving performance with ABS.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Charles Kahane and Charles
Farmer for their helpful comments on an earlier version
of this paper. Special thanks go to Charles Farmer for
providing us with his vehicle exposure data.
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