Managing Heavy Drinking to Avoid Impaired Driving: A Study of Interlock Users

描述(申请人提供)：酒精点火联锁，防止司机一直在饮酒启动他们的车辆，已成为最广泛和迅速增长的方法之一，以控制被判在驾驶时受损驾驶(DWI)的个人给驾驶公众带来的风险。研究表明，违法者可以在不大幅减少饮酒量或减少驾驶的情况下，学会互锁驾驶，避免停摆。目前尚不清楚的是，这种重度饮酒者--甚至是依赖饮酒者--如何调整他们的酒后驾驶行为，以驾驶配备联锁的车辆，以及为什么一旦解除联锁，他们就会恢复正常的酒后驾驶行为。这种恢复到联锁前水平的累犯率是对这一迅速扩大的对受损司机的制裁有效性的主要限制。为了回答这个问题，这项研究将收集500名酒后驾车初犯者的自我报告、生物学和官方记录数据，这些人被判处6个月的连锁监禁。收集的数据涵盖联锁装置安装前的6个月、联锁装置在车辆上的6个月以及联锁装置拆除后的6个月。将使用时间线跟踪方法来构建每个时期的酒后驾驶实践的详细场景。这些自我报告的数据将通过头发和血液中的生物标记物和连锁呼气测试来补充酒精消费的客观衡量标准。将对数据进行审查，以确定罪犯为避免停摆而使用的应对方法(例如，在家中饮酒与在家外)，以及从参与者在正常法律威慑条件下驾驶的逮捕前阶段、参与者饮酒时被禁止驾驶的联锁阶段到联锁解除后6个月期间这些应对机制的轨迹。了解酒后驾车罪犯如何改变他们的饮酒和/或驾驶行为以启动他们的汽车将对治疗专家、缓刑官员、 以及处理酒后驾车违规者的连锁供应商。更重要的是，这些结果将为开发干预措施提供基础，这些干预措施将联锁期间采用的改变酒后驾驶行为的安全益处扩展到联锁解除后的驾驶寿命。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Alcohol ignition interlocks that prevent drivers who have been drinking from starting their vehicles have become one of the most widely used and rapidly growing methods for controlling the risk that individuals convicted of driving while impaired (DWI) present to the driving public. Research has shown that offenders can learn to drive with an interlock and avoid lockouts without substantially reducing the quantity of alcohol they consume or curtailing their driving. What is not known is how such heavy-even dependent drinkers- adjust their drinking/driving behavior in order to drive interlock-equipped vehicles and why having made that adjustment they return to their normal drinking-driving behavior once the interlock is removed. This return to pre-interlock levels of recidivism is a major limitation on th effectiveness of this rapidly expanding sanction for impaired drivers. To answer that question, this study will collect self-report, biological, and official record data on the drinking and the driving of 500 first DWI offenders sentenced to 6 months on the interlock. Data will be collected covering the 6 months before the interlock is installed, the 6 months when the interlock is on the vehicle, and the 6 months following its removal. The Timeline Follow-back method will be used to build detailed scenarios of drinking-driving practices in each of those periods. These self-report data will be augmented with objective measures of alcohol consumption from biomarkers in hair and blood and interlock breath tests. Data will be examined to determine the coping methods (e.g., drinking at home versus away from home) used by offenders to avoid lockouts and the trajectories of those coping mechanisms in transition from the pre-arrest period, when the participant was driving under normal legal deterrence conditions, to the period on the interlock when the participant is prevented from driving if drinking, to the 6 months after the interlock is removed. Knowledge about how DWI offenders change their drinking and/or driving behaviors in order to start their cars will be useful to treatment specialists, probation officers, and interlock providers who deal with DWI offenders. More significantly, these results will provide a basis for developing interventions that extend the safety benefits of the altered drinking-driving behaviors adopted while on the interlock into the lifetime of driving following interlock removal.