Women Better at Parking Cars?

Everyone has heard the sexist cliches about ‘women drivers’ but a new study says they found the women and men in their survey group revealed a trend contradicting that old discriminatory view.

The NCP Parking Report studied 2,500 UK drivers. Some of the activities documented were:

Appropriate space finding speed

Good or very good ‘pre-parking pose ‘

Reverse into space

Forward into space

Speed of manoeuvre

In most of the eight categories women were observed to be better, except for one which was speed of manoeuvre. At first glance, it might seem the men had done better because they parked more quickly. However, parking quickly might actually be one of the reason the men did worse in the other categories because going slower generally indicates caution and thoughtfulness when parking. In other words, being in a hurry makes it more likely one might bump nearby cars, rub your tires hard against a curb, drive up on the curb, brush against a wall or tree and so forth.

Another indication of the extra care the women drivers took was that over 50% of the time, they parked centrally, meaning they positioned their cars in the middle of each parking space. Men did this about 26% of the time in the survey. Are the results showing women to be better at parking specific to the United Kingdom, or are they generalizable to other countries as well? One could argue women generally are more conscious of the group experience and rules of etiquette, so that might explain why the women in the study were more careful and courteous while parking.

Image Credit: Arpingstone Public Domain

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Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

J.L. A.

7:23AM PDT on Mar 25, 2012

interesting

send a green star

KS G.

5:23AM PDT on Mar 25, 2012

Thanks for the article.

Eternal G.

3:55PM PST on Mar 5, 2012

Don't think it's gender related, more to do with your personal driving abilities- I know of lousy drivers of both genders and vice versa!

Sweetboy S.

12:07PM PST on Feb 23, 2012

I do agree with Mrs Shakespeare
In some countries may be women are good in parking but in some counrties its totally opposite.

Sarah M.

9:15PM PST on Feb 20, 2012

So true!

Mrs S.

4:19AM PST on Feb 16, 2012

For some reason, I cant believe this, sisters. Haha!

Mandi A.

9:44AM PST on Feb 14, 2012

I find this to be very true :)

Juliet D.

8:17AM PST on Feb 14, 2012

As far as I can see, it depends on how tall you are, and what kind of vehicle you drive. If you can't see where your bumpers are, obviously, you'll have a problem.

Berny P.

7:35AM PST on Feb 14, 2012

I think there are good and bad drivers in both sexes and we should not go pointing a finger at any particular one!!

Margarita P.

5:15AM PST on Feb 14, 2012

I am always impressed by people who can parallel park, whether they are men or women.