Linking personal norms and descriptive norms to pedestrians' intention to jaywalk: the mediating role of anticipated regret and risk perception

Pedestrians have been involved in approximately one-third of traffic accidents in China. As important social contextual factors, social norms play important roles in predicting unsafe behaviors among pedestrians. Based on the focus theory of normative conduct and self-construal, the current study aims to explore the mediating role of anticipated regret and risk perception in the relationship between two norms (personal and descriptive) and pedestrians' intention to jaywalk, as well as the moderating role of self-construal. A total of 409 adult pedestrians participated in our questionnaire survey, with 342 valid data collected. Results showed that both personal and descriptive norms significantly predicted pedestrians' intention to jaywalk. Anticipated regret (emotional path) and risk perception (cognitive path) had significant mediating effects. Specifically, the more negative the personal norms, the lower the pedestrians' anticipated regret, and the higher the intention to violate the traffic rules. The more negative the descriptive norms, the lower the pedestrians' risk perception, and the higher the intention to violate the traffic rules. In addition, self-construal moderated the aforementioned relationship. Specifically, for pedestrians who were higher on independent self-construal, personal norms had a stronger effect on intention through anticipated regret. For pedestrians who were higher on interdependent self-construal, descriptive norms had a stronger effect on the intention through the anticipated regret and risk perception. Finally, the contributions of the current study to pedestrian safety interventions are discussed.