Understanding seat‐belt use: A test of Bentler and Speckart's extension of the ‘theory of reasoned action’

It is shown that Fishbein's ‘theory of reasoned action’ can be used to explain people's intentions to wear seat belts. As Bentler and Speckart (1979) have proposed, a self-report measure of past behaviour is shown to significantly improve the model's power; this extended Fishbein model being capable of accounting for the majority of the effects that extraneous variables, which are known to influence seat-belt use, have upon a person's behavioural intentions. In addition, it is shown that the model's motivation to comply term is, as Ajzen and Fishbein (1980) have proposed, a unipolar rather than a bi-polar construct, but that even when this construct is scored as unipolar, it does not significantly add to the model's predictive power. Cette etude montre que la thterie de ‘l'action raisonnee’ de Fishbein explique l'intention que les gens ont de porter leur ceinture de securite. La puissance du modele est augmentee en employant, suivant la suggestion de Bentler and Speckart (1979) une mesure du souvenir du comportement passe. Cette addition au modele de Fishbein permet de rendre compte de la majorite des effets que des variales externes (dont on connaǐt l'impact sur l'usage des ceintures de securite) ont sur les intentions comportementales d'une personne. De plus, on confirme l'idee d'Ajzen and Fishbein (1980) suivant laquelle la motivation a agir est une construction unipolaire plutǒt que bipolaire. On montre cependant qu'une cotation unipolaire n'ajoute rien a la valeur predictive du modele.

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