AARP and eDriving Team Up for Pilot Study to Help Make Drivers Safer and More Confident

Washington, D.C. and Oakland, Calif. — [August 21, 2018] — How can drivers remain confident as they age? That’s a critical question that faces drivers 50 and older, and two organizations committed to keeping drivers safe through effective deployment of technologies and education will team up to understand how best to empower these drivers.

AARP – through its 39-year-old safe-driving initiative, AARP Driver Safety – has chosen safe driving innovator eDriving^SM and its Mentor by eDriving^SM telematics app to power a study that will help measure, score and coach the driving behavior of a select group of drivers. This new pilot study will help determine the extent to which telematics – coupled with coaching and education provided directly through the smartphone app – can help improve driver safety in the 50 and over population.

The 12-week study, which will launch with more than 500 participants, will use the Mentor smartphone-based app that uses telematics sensors in the phone to track specific driver actions. Mentor scores driver behavior after each trip and provides immediate feedback to the driver in the form of the FICO^® Safe Driving Score, as well as specific insights and coaching related to behaviors behind the wheel. Mentor will also allow study participants to compare their scores with one another, enabling a shared experience and better informed conversations about safe driving.

The goal of the AARP Driver Safety-eDriving study is to increase safe driving through the reduction of risky behaviors including speeding, hard braking, and distracted driving. Participants in the study will be surveyed prior to using Mentor to define their current driving habits and measure how well they believe they are driving. Throughout the study, performance data will be analyzed to not only discover if Mentor improved participant scores over time, but also to help shape the way drivers are educated in the future. A post-study survey will further confirm behavioral shifts resulting from drivers’ use of Mentor.

About eDriving

eDriving is the largest provider of online driver training and global driver risk management serving more than 2 million drivers this year in over 95 countries. eDriving provides the industry’s most comprehensive portfolio of patented and award-winning driver risk reduction programs, validated by large-scale research studies, and refined over 20+ years of experience with some of the world’s largest corporations, including Nestlé, Johnson & Johnson, Mondelez, BT, Merck, Pfizer and more. eDriving’s portfolio also includes the largest offering of novice, adult and mature driving courses. Mentor by eDriving is the latest evolution and most powerful application of its programmatic approach to measurably changing driver behaviors. For more, visit www.edriving.com.

About AARP Driver Safety

AARP Driver Safety first launched in 1979 as the “55 Alive” program to help to keep older drivers independent, safe, healthy and confident while on the road. Today, AARP Driver Safety has reached nearly 18 million drivers, and counting, through its leading educational programs that include the AARP Smart Driver™ course, CarFit℠, and We Need to Talk. The flagship AARP Smart Driver course is the nation’s largest classroom and online driver safety course and is designed especially for drivers age 50 and older, available in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories. More than 4,500 AARP Driver Safety volunteers nationwide help coordinate and instruct the in-person classroom course. AARP Driver Safety is developing new programs to help navigate the rapidly evolving vehicle technology landscape, including Smart DriverTEK, developed jointly with The Hartford. For more information, visit www.aarp.org/drive.