Rubbernecking
Rubbernecking is a term primarily used to refer to bystanders stopping previous activity to stare at accidents. More generally, it can refer to anyone staring at an object of everyday interest compulsively. The term rubbernecking derives from the neck's appearance while trying to get a better view, that is, craning one's neck.
Rubberneck is associated with morbid curiosity. It is often the cause of traffic jams, sometimes referred to as "gapers' block" or "gapers' delay", as drivers slow down to see what happened in a crash. Rubberneck is considered as of 2007 unconventional English or slang.
Etymology
The term rubbernecking was coined in the United States in the 1890s to refer to tourists. H. L. Mencken said the word rubberneck is "almost a complete treatise on American psychology" and "one of the best words ever coined".By 1909, rubbernecking was used to describe the wagons, automobiles and buses used in tours around American cities, and through their Chinatowns. The tours included a megaphone-wielding individual offering commentary on the urban landscape. Chinese Rubbernecks was the title of a 1903 film.
One writer described the "out-of-towners" stretching their necks to see New York while having misinformation shouted at them, and artist John Sloan depicted them as geese in a 1917 etching called Seeing New York. Hawkers, touts and steerers were used to market the rubbernecking tours, also known as "gape wagons" or "yap wagons."
When phone lines were shared as "party lines", the term rubbernecking applied to someone who listened in on the conversation of others.