Basically the above; what drives people to behave in a way that is sometimes outright murderous? Who are offenders and do they have certain traits in common?
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I forget where I read it, but there was some research showing two things:
first, on top of some of the other factors that other comments have already mentioned–people in cars tend to view cars *as an extension of them as a person*. So an affront to a car becomes linked in our minds as an affront upon our person.
second, being in cars adds social distance, in other words our capacity for empathy for the other person in the other car is reduced (edit: basically, we become less capable of seeing the humanity in the other person and start treating them more like an “other”). When a pedestrian accidentally walks too close to another pedestrian, the two people will basically apologize to each other, give each other more space, and then continue walking. When a car gets too close to another car, you can easily devolve into a road rage incident.
edit: what’s important to recognize is that these are not things that are the fault of the driver *per se*. these are things that are inherent to driving, at least the way cars and driving are set up right now. some people will cope better with emotions and anger. some people will not. but you can take an otherwise pleasant person and put them in a car and all of these factors combined can turn them into a barely constrained rageball. some people in urbanist circles talk derisively about “car brain” or “windshield perspective” and in a way it’s true. the physical form of cars and how we arrange our driving spaces just mess with our brains. some countries and cities and cultures do better than others in coping or arranging the built environment to lower the temperature of driving.
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