It's the million dollar question: just why do some motorists hate people on bikes?

Honour’s column last week talked about the so-called war on the streets. And in my column a fortnight ago, I was discussing the matter with my unexpectedly reactionary barber. Apparently we all cycle like idiots.

We all want to discover the “real” reason why so many motorists hate people who cycle. You can chuck around vague hypotheses like “drivers envy the true freedom of the bike”.

But I felt there had to be a bit more of a scientific reason, and I’ve discovered there might be.

It’s all down to Social Identity Theory and the concept of the “in-group/out-group”. SIT is a general psychological theory, not one related solely to cycling. According to SIT, drivers see other drivers as part of their “in-group”, and see cyclists as an “out-group”, to be discriminated against.

The in-group classifies any negative behaviour of the out-group as stereotypical and problematic no matter how harmless or trivial it is. This stereotypical antisocial behaviour becomes the reason that the out-group is discriminated against.

On the other hand, any negative or antisocial behaviour of the in-group is classified as the transgression of an individual rather than representative of the in-group itself.

In other words, because of drivers’ prejudices and the fact they’re the majority road user, one rotten cyclist ruins the barrel for everyone else who rides, while one rotten driver is … one rotten driver.

I guess there are other contributing factors, unrelated to the “in-group/out-group” theory. But the more I think about it the more SIT makes sense.

The pervasiveness of the in-group is interesting. Imagine you’re driving. You’re approaching a red light.

The signal turns amber, so you brake. But the car in front of you picks up speed and whizzes through the junction a good two seconds after the light has turned red.

Do you think: a) “that was a stupid thing to do”, or: b) “all drivers are stupid”? It doesn’t matter whether you’re a petrolhead or you drive and cycle, your answer is almost certainly going to be a).

Now imagine you’re approaching another red light, still driving. The signal turns amber, so you brake. But the bicycle in front of you whizzes through the junction a good two seconds after the light has turned red. Do you think: a) “that cyclist was really stupid”, or: b) “all cyclists are stupid”? Many drivers will plump for b), though if you’re a cyclist who drives, you’ll feel strongly for a) and probably add something like “and they give us all a bad name”.

Multiply this by hundreds of thousands of daily negative interactions, add the fan of social media to this (f)ire, and it’s easy to see why the wildfire of the “war on the roads” gets out of hand.

The million dollar question now is: how can we control the wildfire? How can we change this “in-group/out-group” stigmatisation?