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A study released earlier this month suggests raising the age teens can get a driver’s license could prevent injuries and death.

“There are two issues,” said Anne Fleming, spokeswoman for the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, the group that conducted the study. “Youth and immaturity, and inexperience behind the wheel.”

Inexperience will always be a cause in new-driver crashes, Fleming said, but this study showed younger drivers posed a higher risk.

According to the study, new 17- and 18-year-old drivers had fewer accidents than new 16-year-old drivers, Fleming said. The study did not tell why 16-year-olds are more apt to crash.

Some 16-year-olds are less mature and less equipped to drive than their counterparts, said Dr. Steve Hougen, trauma director for Citizens Medical Center.

“New drivers should be extra cautious,” Hougen said.

Part of the reason states with higher driving ages have fewer teen crashes is there aren’t as many young drivers on the road, Hougen said.

Fleming agreed, but said that doesn’t nullify the study's findings.

“It does reduce the exposure,” she said. “Just taking the 16-year-old drivers off the road does have an impact.”

Victoria resident Jesse Torres, 33, said he thinks a higher driving age would be most helpful if teens had learner’s permits for an extra year.

Torres first got a driver’s license when he was 16, he said.

“It probably would have been better if I waited a year,” he said.