Tense, nervous, about to explode? Don't worry it's only road rage, a phenomenon experienced by more than three-quarters of motorists according to a survey published this week. Road rage is even more advanced in the UK, where nine out of 10 motorists claim to have been victims. When Derek Wilton had a heart attack and died after a run in with a Range Rover driver he became the first character in a soap to suffer death by road rage.

The passing of the Coronation Street stalwart signalled a new stage of the phenomenon. After all, if it is acceptable in society, it is never long before it appears in the soaps. Residents of Fair City be warned.

The survey, compiled on behalf of the motor insurance company Guardian Direct, depicts a nation of motorists hell-bent on tooting horns, flashing lights and making rude or aggressive gestures.

While only 1 per cent of those surveyed said they had experienced physical assault on the roads, many believe road rage is gradually reaching boiling point.

Mary (not her real name), who works in Guardian Direct, says a recent experience in Blackrock, Co Dublin, made the survey results believable.

"I was stopped at a traffic lights when a man in a Mercedes drove up beside me," she says. Mary thought she was being helpful when she rolled down her window and informed the man that this was a two-way street.

"He went mad," she says. "At the next traffic lights he got out of his car and started shouting abuse at me."

He then proceeded to punch Mary, first on her upper arm and then on her face, until a passer-by managed to pull him away.

While Mary's experience is not common here, the problem of road rage appears to have intensified since the phrase was first coined in the United States six years ago. So is it a sign of the stress-filled times or just bad manners masquerading behind a tabloid-friendly tag?

Yes and no, say the experts. "Road rage has been around as long as there have been roads," says Conor Faughnan, spokesman for AA Roadwatch, who welcomes the first Irish examination of the phenomenon. "On the other hand it is very real and not, as some have said, a media invention." Mr Faughnan maintains while there are fewer cars per capita on the Republics's streets than in other European states, infrastructure does not lend itself to incident-free driving.

"And when there are more people trying to get from A to B in as short as possible time, that leads to frustration," he says.

The ideal reaction to incidents of road rage is "no reaction". "Don't become part of the problem," says Mr Faughnan, who himself has been a victim of road rage type behaviour. "There is no point in expressing your anger by flashing lights or beeping the horn, it will only exacerbate things."

Road rage has been creeping into the headlines increasingly in recent years. The first mention of it in this newspaper was in 1994.

Since then various judges have alluded to road rage when handing down fines. This has ranged from reprimanding motorists for two-fingered salutes to berating belligerent drivers who had displayed ignorant, aggressive behaviour.

One man was fined a total of £300 for forcing a woman motorist who was towing a horse box to pull over onto a hard shoulder. He later told gardai she was "thick and ignorant" and just waiting to become a victim of road rage. The Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey, said he had no comment to make on the road rage phenomenon. Figures from his Department show the numbers of private cars on the road have increased from 858,498 to 1,057,383.

A Garda spokesman declined to comment to make on the survey but insisted that incidences of road rage were "very rare. It is a very difficult thing to pin down when you are talking about everything from beeping horns to physical assault".

Dermot Devlin, marketing manager of Guardian Direct, says there a number of measures which could ease the apparent tension on Irish roads.

"Law enforcement is a major factor," he says. "There is nothing worse than observing someone flouting the traffic laws and getting away with it." He says schemes such as Operation Lifesaver and Operation Freeflow are "crucial".

"However," he adds, "you will always have those who are just bad mannered or incompetent drivers and this leads to obvious problems".

According to Dr Ray Fuller, a specialist in transportation safety at the Department of Psychology in Trinity College Dublin, our behaviour changes when we get behind the wheel.

"It seems we are less concerned about social censure on the roads. Surrounded by our metal suit of armour we feel invulnerable and as a result are less discriminate in our behaviour," he says.

IN other words, a normal, well-adjusted person would not dream of shouting at an elderly woman who bumped into them on a footpath, but when that old woman is behind the wheel of a car the situation changes.

Mr Fuller says: "It is exactly the same as hurling abuse at a politician who appears on TV. You are unlikely to do this if you met him at dinner."

Mr Fuller recommends fantasising as a way of avoiding conflict. "Instead of giving vent to your road rage imagine yourself getting revenge on the person who has upset you," he says.

Mr Fuller's favourite anti-road rage fantasy is mentally daubing the offending vehicle with indelible paint - "or sometimes I just wish I was driving a tank."