Investigating Psychological Factors Affecting Empathy of Traffic Police with Road Users

Some experts believe that empathy of traffic police with users can be effective in modifying and changing user behavior. Drivers expect that the traffic police see the occurrences from their point of view. Hence, this study is trying to find out some factors affecting empathy. The target population included all 4000 employees of Tehran's traffic police as well as unlimited number of traffic users. According to Morgan table, sample sizes are 351 and 385 for staff and users respectively. The present study is practical in terms of target and is descriptive in terms of method and data processing. In order to measure employee's psychological capital and staff empathy with users, Luthans standard questionnaire and Davis questionnaire were used respectively. The reliability of the questionnaire has been approved through Cronbach's alpha coefficient (0.826 and 0.902 respectively). The results of Pearson correlation and linear regression showed that confidence and resiliency factors have no significant effect on empathy of Tehran traffic police with users. So, hopefulness and the sanguine have a significant effect on empathy. The one-sample t test showed that traffic police staff has an average-level empathy with the users. While binomial test showed that empathy of traffic users with traffic police is on high level.