Bad Bike Rider Corollary Effect

The book Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us) aside from just being generally fascinating in what it reveals about our driving habits has some good insights into driver/cyclist dynamics as well. Citing a study by English psychologist Ian Walker, the book points out that car drivers tend to give more slack and be more cautious around cyclist whom they can not predict and whom do not appear to know what they are doing, i.e.

• The further a cyclist rides from edge of the rode, the more space drivers give them
• Drivers will pass closer to cyclist wearing helmets than those not.
• Drivers pass further around a woman than a man (in other, non-cycling traffic studies, the majority of drivers, women included, treat women drivers as less predictable)
  
• At an intersection, cyclist who fail to signal a turn are treated more cautiously than those who do.

Apparently, the best way to avoid being hit by a car is to not wear a helmet, wear a dress and ride erratically. It's truly a great study that will give readers a whole new perspective on driver/cyclist dynamics.

Will I, however, follow this line of reasoning? Heck no! For what I term the the Bad Bike Rider Corollary Effect.

Corollary is defined as a "proposition that follows from another that has been proved."  As such the above law has been proven. What remains to be seen/studied is how the driver will then treat the next bike rider they come upon, and the next, and the next. Having now ridden in several group rides and followed both good and bad riders, both Lycra-clad and non, I can tell you that the more badly behaving, non-signaling, non-riding to the right bike riders a car has to pass, the less leeway they give and the less cautious they become.  Heck, even I do it.