**Author details**

*Models and Technologies for Smart, Sustainable and Safe Transportation Systems*

In a current study, del Valle [74] analyzed whether there are differences between optimistic offender drivers and non-offender drivers in counterfactual thoughts and emotions, under induced control conditions. The functionality of counterfactual thoughts and negative emotions appears under situations with unfavourable outcomes, where more causal reasoning appears [91]. When optimistic offender drivers generate counterfactual thinking to explain the mistakes made. They may overestimate their abilities and seek different excuses, focusing on external aspects of the situation ("If it hadn't snowed, then I could have avoided the accident") to justify their unwanted results [65, 92]. With this justification, it would be possible to reduce the size of the problem, instead of considering other possibilities (i.e., lack of knowledge for driving in snow) [93]. Overestimating their abilities leads them to ignore, or at least underestimate, the negative feedback provided by the environment [65, 94]. In the study del Valle [74] optimistic offenders drivers recorded the lowest values of negative emotions (i.e., guilt and shame). When a person experiences shame, what they create is a desire to flee and disappear. Whereas, in guilt, the person tends to carry out an action that amends the generated result [95, 96]. Our interest is focused on the emotion of guilt. Echeburúa, Corral and Amor [97] point out that guilt is not an end in itself, but is a regulatory emotion that, in general, leads to repair and the avoidance of future damage. In investigations carried out by Tangney's team [98–100] have commented that emotions such as guilt depend on the person's negative judgement of their action. This emotion tends to appear in situations in which a failure is perceived, there is a perception of controllability in their actions and, therefore, the driver is attributed internal responsibility for it (e.g., "If I had not drunk, I would have avoided the accident"). Some authors [96] have commented that guilt can encourage actions to amend the result generated: on the one hand, these drivers do not feel guilt, and on the other, they attribute responsibility for the result to external aspects (e.g., "If the pedestrian had not crossed, I would have avoided the accident). Although we cannot reach a causal implication because we do not use a causal model, we do think these two separate sets of findings could be related.

it is a fact that highly skilled drivers, or those who believe they are, may be at greater risk due to their tendency to take risks on the road. In this chapter, we have delimitated the characteristics of a group of optimistic offender drivers, which reveal, on the hand, a great lack of understanding of the true impact that external factors can have on driving and; on the other hand, they tend to overestimate their abilities and overconfident in their ability to avoid accidents. In addition, these drivers do not usually experience negative emotions when they fail. All this, together is what increases the probability of suffering an accident. The consideration of the different cognitive profiles in the perception of the risk or challenge when facing potential traffic situations may provide the instructors on these courses with a better understanding of the true nature of those attending. It is not the same to draw attention to the limitations in terms of skills and capacity of someone who has a generally optimistic view of situations they perceive to be controllable, as to point out those limitations to someone with a generally pessimistic outlook regarding those self-same situations. The ability to restructure cognitive distortions and dismantle mistaken beliefs might be an important feature of courses of this kind, as well as in the instruction of new drivers. This should therefore be a priority to increase the effectiveness of driver rehabilitation courses following the withdrawal of points, and reduce the likelihood of a relapse, which would mean a further step

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forward in the prevention of road accidents.

**6. Conclusion**

Carlos Hugo Criado del Valle1 \* and Parichehr Scharifi2

1 Faculty of Psychology, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain

2 Center for Technology and Society (ZTG), Technische Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany

\*Address all correspondence to: delvalle@usal.es

© 2021 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
