Originally Posted by fatbat
>For example, it's been shown that overall cycling rates are associated with crash rates- an increase in number of cylclists is assocated with a lower overall crash rate in the absence of changes to helmet usage.
The more people ride- the more overall cycling ability they have, and the more cars expect to be interacting with cyclists. If the helmet usage is covarying with the The authors assert that the drop in cycling is connected to the helmet laws, but that data was was not actually investigated by the study.
Half a sentence seems to be missing, but I guess you say that the drop in cyclist numbers increases the risk, and that's why helmet laws don't work. Even if that's true, helmet laws are still ********. But things like drivers' awareness to cyclists probably don't change in 3 years, so I guess it's irrelevant
Originally Posted by fatbat
Risk compensation theory and voluntary helmet use by cyclists in Spain.:
Committing a traffic violation was associated with a lower frequency of helmet use (adjusted odds ratio (aOR) 0.63, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.58 to 0.69). The results suggest that the subgroup of cyclists with a higher risk of suffering a traffic crash are also those in which the health consequences of the crash will probably be higher.
Quite likely the correlation between helmet use and rule-abiding is... Uptight people tend to do the proper thing: wear a helmet, stop at the stoplight. Rebels, messengers, punks etc. don't do either. That doesn't really mean that putting on a helmet doesn't give you a false sense of security. We all know that traffic rules don't have all that much to do with a biker's safety anyway, so the whole point of looking at that data correlation is debatable. If I put on a helmet, I may become even more reckless
Thanks for a good post, though. I'll try and wrap my head around the rest when I'm more concentrated.