It might not settle the argument of whether men or women are the better drivers, but a behavioural expert at Goldsmiths University claims to know who the angriest motorists are.

Patrick Fagan, a psychologist who lectures at the uni in New Cross, conducted an experiment which ‘sense tested’ 1,000 drivers to see gauge their emotional responses in different driving scenarios.

It concluded women are on average 12 per cent grumpier than men when they’re behind the wheel.

The research found driving sparked ancient ‘defence’ instincts in women when they were undertaken, shouted at or beeped, had to deal with a back-seat driver or were faced with a road user who failed to indicate.

Women were more likely to respond with anger than male drivers in all the test scenarios.

Mr Fagan said: “Psychologically, women score higher than men on emotional and verbal intelligence, and on the personality trait of neuroticism.

“Evolutionary theory suggests our early female ancestors had to develop an acute sense of danger for anything that threatened them and their young if their cave was undefended while men were out hunting. That ‘early warning system’ instinct is still relevant today, and women drivers tend to be more sensitive to negative stimuli, so get angry and frustrated quicker.”

Mr Fagan and car manufacturer Hyundai have used data from the research and cutting-edge technology to create the Driving Emotion Test (DET) involving facial coding equipment, eye-tracking analysis, galvanic skin response and a heartrate monitor to record how specific stimuli impact our emotions when we’re on the road.

The results are then fed into specially-created software to provide subjects with a unique DET score.

There’s also a simpler online version of the DET which you can take at www.houseofhyundai.com