Each year, thousands of pedestrians are killed or injured while crossing streets in the United States. Pedestrians who jaywalk across busy intersections increase their risk of being injured by an automobile. The present series of studies investigated pedestrian jaywalking behaviors under temporal conditions which appeared to control noncompliance and compliance with pedestrian walk signs. An intersection involving three major streets was the target site of the studies. The timing of walk and no-walk light sequences was different in the clockwise and counterclockwise direction and produced differential delays. In three separate studies, significantly more pedestrians jaywalked when walking in the long-delay as opposed to short-delay direction. Traffic planners might use these findings to establish safer pedestrian signal systems.
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