Examining Thailand’s Recent Motorcycle Helmet Compliance Campaigns
Program: Data Science Master's Degree
Location: Not Specified (remote)
Student: Jeffrey Orcutt
More than 1.7 million motorcyclists required hospital treatment from 2018 to 2023, according to data from the Thai Government’s Injury Surveillance System. The research sought to assess the effectiveness of helmet usage promotion and enforcement efforts to reduce accident-related hospitalizations in Thailand through random forest models. Partial dependencies from the models were analyzed to provide insights into the demographic and environmental correlational factors. Age proved to be the most important factor within the models. For the youngest riders, the predicted probability of wearing a helmet was relatively low, then rose sharply through the early-to-mid 20s to reach a peak, a predicted probability of helmet wearing of approximately 0.20, in the late 20s or early 30s. After this point, the curve gradually declines, settling for a more moderate probability for individuals in their 50s and 60s, though it remains higher than for the youngest riders.