As American roadways became ever more congested in the 1980s and 1990s, drivers began to experience, either as aggressors or victims, a new phenomenon called "road rage." Reports of violence and shootings provoked by incidental breeches of driving etiquette caused an escalating level of paranoia surrounding driving and heightened its presence in the media and the popular imagination. News headlines announced "Five-Year-Old Victim of Road-Rage Shootout," "Father Charged with 'Road Rage' Killing of Son," "Ugly Increase in Acts of Freeway Fury." While the occurrence of shootings while driving began to epitomize road rage in the 1990s, road rage was characterized by any display of aggression by a driver including verbal abuse, tailgating, hand gestures, intimidating stares, or violence. The American Automobile Association (AAA) reported in 1997 that incidents of "aggressive driving" where an "angry or impatient driver tries to kill or injure another driver after a traffic...