Women have a 17% higher risk of death and are twice as likely to suffer a brain injury in a car accident

• Female drivers are 17% more likely to die and twice as likely to suffer serious brain injury. They are also almost 50% more likely to fracture their skull.
• Many women are forced to get too close to the steering wheel as they cannot reach the pedals properly. This greatly increases the likelihood of serious injuries to the chest, face and neck if the airbag is activated.
• Seat-belt design fosters the "submarining" effect for female drivers: slippage in the seat that can cause significant internal injuries due to the pressure of the lower band on the stomach. Seat belts also do not take into account the female chest or adequately protect women's shoulders.
• The female body was not traditionally taken into account in crash tests, as the dummies most commonly used in these tests are two male prototypes from the 50th and 95th percentile, with just one female prototype from the 5th percentile, which is merely an adaptation of the male body.
• There are several possible reasons for this: there are more male drivers, they drive more, they generally make the decision to buy the car, and they have worse accident rates. 90% of those killed in traffic accidents in Spain in the last decade, and 85% of those seriously injured, were men.
• 77% of Spanish motorists believe there is still a lot of prejudice against women drivers. This prejudice is strongest in Extremadura, Valencia and Castilla La Mancha, and weakest in La Rioja, Madrid and the Murcia region. 

Madrid, 7 November 2023. 50th and 95th percentile male dummies and 5th percentile female models, which are simply an adaptation of the male body, were traditionally used in passive safety testing of cars. And this largely determined that vehicle design is based on the anatomy of men rather than women.

Being aware of this, the Línea Directa Foundation and the Comillas Pontifical University have performed a computerised crash test to reproduce a head-on collision in identical circumstances for both genders: a female model in the 50th percentile and a male model in the 50th percentile. This crash test revealed some striking conclusions. Considering the anatomy of each gender (as determined through a Computed Tomography, or CT, scan), female drivers could be twice as likely to suffer serious brain injury and nearly 50% more likely to fracture their skull in a head-on collision. Other studies have found that women also have a 17% higher risk of dying in an accident.

The reasons for this are clear. Women of short or medium stature are forced to get too close to the steering wheel as they cannot reach the pedals properly. This greatly increases the likelihood of serious injuries to the chest, face and neck if the airbag is activated. The design of seat belts also favours the "submarining" effect in female drivers, with slipping in the seat that means the lower part of the seatbelt can cause serious internal injuries in the event of a collision. This is the leading cause of foetal mortality from trauma injuries. Seat belt design also fails to consider the female chest and does not protect women's shoulders adequately.

These are some of the main findings of the study "Safe Cars for All. Analysis of accidents from a gender perspective (2012-2021)", which was presented today by the Línea Directa Foundation. This study was performed with Centro Zaragoza and the Comillas Pontifical University Technological Research Institute. It analyses the accident rates for each gender, the official accident statistics for men and women over the last 10 years, and passive safety tests, among other aspects. The report also included a survey of 1,700 drivers from all over the country, in which the motorists gave their opinion on the relationship between driving and gender.

Why have cars traditionally been designed for men?

The main reasons why cars are more focussed on the male anatomy are historical. There are more male than female drivers (56% men to 44% women, a proportion that increases significantly with age); men spend more time driving (+70%); men have more weight in car-buying decisions (+22 p.p.); and men have higher accident, injury and mortality rates.

According to official Department of Transport (DGT) figures, 90% of drivers killed in traffic accidents in the last decade in Spain, and 85% of those seriously injured were men, with the fatality rate being four times higher than for women. 92% of drivers who died in traffic accidents in 2022 who tested positive for drugs or alcohol were men and 73% of those penalised were also men.  

There are also significant differences between the genders in the most frequent fatal accidents. The most common cause for women is a head-on collision (22%) with a car (77%), while the most common fatal accident for men is a collision caused by leaving the carriageway with a collision (23%) with another vehicle, although in a much smaller proportion (46%). 

What do Spanish men think about female drivers?

77% of Spanish motorists believe that there is still a lot of prejudice against female drivers, a percentage that, in the case of women, reaches 86%. This prejudice is strongest in Extremadura, Valencia and Castilla La Mancha, and weakest in La Rioja, Madrid and the Murcia region.

Female drivers attribute the higher accident rate among men to the fact that, in general, they "drive faster and break the rules more" (34%), while men believe that it is because they "drive a lot more kilometres" (26%), something they usually do "out of habit" (55%). Some attitudes persist among male drivers, as one in five of them admit to having insulted a female driver by alluding to her gender.