Common before-after accident study on a road site: a low-informative Bayesian method

This note aims at providing a Bayesian methodological basis for routine before-after accident studies, often applied to a single road site, and in conditions of limited resources in terms of time and expertise. Methods: A low-informative Bayesian method is proposed for before-after accident studies using a comparison site or group of sites. As compared to conventional statistics, the Bayesian approach is less subject to misuse and misinterpretation by practitioners. The low-informative framework seems appropriate in situations of limited expertise. The proposed approach gives the possibility of correcting for regression to the mean. Examples illustrate the application of this method. Results and conclusions: It is shown that a relatively simple method, based on the Jeffreys's rule prior considered as a reasonable standard, can be implemented without major difficulties. Posterior distributions are proper. The numerical calculation of posterior probabilities can be done without using Monte-Carlo simulations nor specialised software tools. Road safety, controlled before-after study, odds-ratio, low-informative prior, Bayes

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Additional Info

Field Value
Source ISSN: 1867-0717
Author Brenac, Thierry
Maintainer CCSD
Last Updated May 10, 2026, 04:42 (UTC)
Created May 10, 2026, 04:42 (UTC)
Identifier hal-00849268
Language en
Rights https://about.hal.science/hal-authorisation-v1/
contributor Département Mécanismes d'Accidents (INRETS/MA) ; Institut National de Recherche sur les Transports et leur Sécurité (INRETS)
creator Brenac, Thierry
date 2009-01-01T00:00:00
harvest_object_id 4d3e7cde-37d9-4946-a168-230773b48546
harvest_source_id 3374d638-d20b-4672-ba96-a23232d55657
harvest_source_title test moissonnage SELUNE
metadata_modified 2024-04-22T00:00:00
relation info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1007/s12544-009-0015-4
set_spec type:ART