Rear seat belt use in the United Arab Emirates

Abstract Wearing seat belts by all vehicle passengers minimizes human and financial losses due to traffic collisions. Little is available in the literature on seat belt wearing rates among rear seat passengers in most developing countries. There is, therefore, a dire need to estimate this rate and to find out how people interact with this traffic safety measure with the aim of finding solutions and developing strategies to improve wearing rates. An observational study was done to estimate the wearing rate of seat belts for passengers on rear seats in a rapidly developing country, the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Also, a questionnaire was distributed to explore demographic characteristics affecting seat belt wearing on rear seats. Observational study results show that the estimated wearing rate in UAE is 12.3% which is very low when compared to developed countries. Questionnaire results show that single, less educated rear seat passengers from Arab and South Asian backgrounds reportedly wear seat belts less than others and that close to two thirds of those surveyed support introducing a seat belt enforcement law on rear seats. Based on the results, it can be concluded that there is an urgent need to introduce a law that enforces wearing seat belts on all motor vehicle rear seats knowing that introducing such a law is likely to have public support based on the findings of the questionnaire. This law should be accompanied with rigorous awareness campaigns that would help in raising public awareness of the importance of wearing rear seat belts and change the public behaviour in this regard.