Friday the 13th, Part 2

Juli linked to this study about Friday the 13th not being more unlucky:

A study published on Thursday by the Dutch Centre for Insurance Statistics (CVS) showed that fewer accidents and reports of fire and theft occur when the 13th of the month falls on a Friday than on other Fridays. . . . In the last two years, Dutch insurers received reports of an average 7,800 traffic accidents each Friday, the CVS study said. But the average figure when the 13th fell on a Friday was just 7,500.

Datacharmer recently made a good comment on this:

Apart from avoiding risky behaviour on Friday the 13th because it is deemed unlucky (which might well be happening), you should also consider that Friday the 13th – unlike other Fridays – CAN’T be Christmas or New Year’s (where people get drunk and drive), and it will also be associated with a lower (or higher) probability of falling before a bank holiday weekend (or I guess in the States Independence day, etc).

I guess all I’m saying that it could well be other factors driving this result other than a change in people’s behaviour because Friday the 13th is ‘unlucky’.

How about accidents on Friday the 12th of Friday the 14th? The article only compares Friday the 13th with an average Friday – in fact, it doesn’t even reveal whether the 13th is least accident prone Friday in the book…

2 thoughts on “Friday the 13th, Part 2

  1. I'd also be interested in knowing what percentages of claims are fraudulant or misdated (e.g., because dates are estimated or misremembered). For some classes of insurance claims it could be quite high! If someone were estimating a date or making up a claim I'd bet they'd avoid dates like Friday 13th (for all sorts of reasons).

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