"Older readers" may remember that this is one of my hobby horses.
In the heady days of the Notional Cycling Strategy, the Transport part of Two Jags vast empire (the "T" in DETR) commissioned research to see if drivers' attitudes and behaviour formed a barrier to cycling (my wording.) The results were published in DRIVERS' PERCEPTIONS OF CYCLISTS TRL549 2002.
When the publication of this report was reported in the CTC mag at that time, it was accompanied by an article by one of the members of the research team who was also a CTC staff member. Although this gave me, at least, the impression that the article was summary of the findings, it was the view of the writer on the subject. I'm relying on memory but IIRC, the thrust was that drivers'attitudes were not a problem: grumpy old cyclists were the problem. (If anybody keeps back-copies of the CTC mag, I'd welcome being corrected.) I wrote a letter to the Ed., which wasn't published, but another was, which referred to the good balance of the article. The point being missed was that the article was not a summary of the research. I don't know to what extent the CTC mag reflected CTC policy, but I'm not aware of the CTC pressing for for the further research recommended in that report, especially this:-
Further research into the behavioural response of drivers to frustrating conditions, including encounters with cyclists, should be conducted in order to establish whether the frustration experienced by drivers is expressed as negative behaviour.
(My emphasis.)
One of the other recommendations has a familiar ring, even though it was made fifteen years ago:-
The current low level of enforcement of traffic law with regard to both drivers and cyclists should be increased.
It's hard to know whether to laugh or cry, because traffic enforcement has deteriorated even further since 2002. Cycling UK has eventually latched onto this.
When this research was first published, only the executive summary was available free, and the main document was something like fifty quid so I never bothered. I've just found it free on PDF. Worth a read. IMO, An opportunity missed by the CTC in 2002 to try to tackle the problems that persist.
I'm only trotting this all out again because Cycling UK is said to be keen to identify and remove barriers to cycling. One of the weaknesses of the research was that as it was commissioned by the Transport ministry, it didn't explicitly make the distinction careless driving and deliberate nastiness, but it's a start.
https://icycleliverpool.files.wordpress ... trl549.pdf