Harvard Injury Control Research Center
Our mission is to reduce the societal burden of injury and violence through surveillance, research, intervention, evaluation, outreach, dissemination, and training.
Promoting empathy among road users to save lives.
Jay A. Winsten, Ph.D., Director
Project Look Out is a road safety campaign sponsored by the Harvard Injury Control Research Center at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. It is funded by a grant from General Motors.
I see you, you see me
Project Look Out envisions the public street as a shared social space where the lives of a multitude of road users intersect and sometimes collide with catastrophic consequences. It’s a place where each traveler’s continued physical existence depends on the actions of others, where the fundamental interconnectedness of human beings is inescapable.
And yet, the street is a place where the reservoir of empathy for “other” people is in short supply; where the dominant emotion often is one of impatience, frustration, anger, even open hostility.
The premise underlying the campaign is that an expanding reservoir of empathy will prompt stronger efforts by road users to “look out for each other” by maintaining situational awareness of their surroundings.
Guided by this premise, Project Look Out will promote a series of simple acts of courtesy and respect among road users to build a culture of empathy, connection, and community. The campaign’s slogan is “I see you, you see me”.
The campaign will include a special focus on building empathy between drivers and pedestrians. Between 2010 and 2023, U.S. pedestrian deaths rose by 77%, compared to a 22% increase in all other road fatalities. In 2023, 7,300 pedestrians were struck and killed by vehicles; an additional 15,000 pedestrians suffered “incapacitating” injuries, a category that includes “severe lacerations, broken or distorted limbs, skull fracture, crushed chest, internal injuries, unconscious when taken from the crash scene, unable to leave the scene without assistance.“
Project Look Out’s strategy includes:
- Encourage Hollywood writers and producers of episodic series and feature films to depict simple acts of courtesy and respect among road users, including when prompted to do so by a companion.
- Through a variety of channels–including social media, news coverage, and talk shows–seek to create a national conversation about road users’ experiences and feelings toward one another and how to improve them.
- Track progress in strengthening empathy among road users over time.
Project Look Out’s strategy and slogan emerged in part from group projects developed by students in a course on Creating Impactful Media Campaigns taught by Dr. Winsten and Hannah Chidekel, MPH, in Harvard Medical School’s Master of Science Program in Media, Medicine, and Health program.
Jay A. Winsten, Ph.D., director of Project Look Out, previously served for thirty-five years as Associate Dean and Frank Stanton Founding Director of the Center for Health Communication at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Under Winsten’s leadership, the Center became widely known for introducing the “Designated Driver” concept into the American culture by forging a partnership with all major Hollywood studios and television networks. The Chronicle of Philanthropy reported, “Many grant makers say it was the success of the campaign that persuaded them that skillful work with news and entertainment media can bring about social change.”