It seems California skipped spring and jumped straight into summer. A major concern in this season is road rage.
We’ve all been in a situation causing inner rage due to poor drivers but it seems the heat causes deep mindless rage urging for retaliation.
“People are definitely more aggressive I think like last week when it was really hot I was gonna make a left turn but had to yield and this car was pissed I wasn’t being an aggressive driver and literally decided to move to the right lane then switch back over and gunned a left turn in front of me and almost got hit,” said Ashley Austria, a University of the Pacific student.
Association of Psychological Science Fellow Craig A. Anderson of Iowa State University, published a research article called Heat and Violence describing the link between aggression and heat called Heat Hypothesis.
Heat Hypothesis, in layman terms, is when the weather begins to rise so do people’s temper because they’re made uncomfortable leading to the possibility of acting on it.
This means if someone cuts you off or are too slow to go for the green light then aggression caused by the heat takes over causing you to do things you normally wouldn’t do like lay on your horn or speed up and try to cut them back off which is reckless and endangering others.
Of course there are many studies but these situations can happen to anyone and that’s terrifying.
Heat is very common in California so these situations can escalate if not given the proper attention.
We see videos of road rage thinking it’s funny until someone is actually hurt.
Road rage is to be taken seriously because the heat makes people unpredictable and nobody like unpredictability.
So if drivers act like dicks by tailgating or flashing their high beams when the speed limit is 30 or 35 on El Dorado Street, sometimes you have to let it go and move over because it isn’t worth your life.