Intelligence and behaviour and motor vehicle accident mortality

Abstract

Risk factors for mortality from motor vehicle accidents (MVAs) were examined in all Australian former National Service conscripts of the Vietnam conflict era, by comparing all those who had died from MVAs since the end of their basic training up until 1982 with a random sample of survivors, using data available from service records. Decedents were in their third and fourth decades. Risk of mortality was higher for men with lower scores on the army intelligence test, with poorer education, with lower preenlistment occupational status, with a history of juvenile offenses before army enlistment, and who went absent without leave (AWOL) during National Service. These factors were modelled using logistic regression, which showed that intelligence plus either lower levels of education or a history of offenses before army service were the most important of these factors in predicting mortality in MVAs.