An investigation into the relationships between area social characteristics and road accident casualties

This paper reports on the analysis of a data base created by merging road casualty information and census data for the former Lothian region in Scotland. The data base was established by assigning resident postcodes to each casualty record and relating these postcodes to the census data for the relevant census output area. Initially, consideration was given to the relationship between casualty frequencies and the distance of the accidents from the zones of residence. As might be anticipated, the casualty frequencies were higher nearer to the zones of residence, possibly due to higher exposure. Subsequently, the relationships between casualty rates and social deprivation indicators for the casualties' zone of residence were investigated. In general it was found that the casualty rates amongst residents from areas classified as relatively deprived were significantly higher than those from relatively affluent areas. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.