But SUVs followed minivans closely, at 28 driver deaths per million registered SUVs, the IIHS study found.
The CR-V and Element also garner IIHS Top Safety Pick awards when equipped with optional ESC systems.
Russ Rader, spokesman for the IIHS, says the institute favors midsize or full-size sedans, the latter being the safest vehicles overall.
For parents who can't afford a new car, the IIHS recommends buying a used car--midsize or larger--with as many modern safety features as possible.
Of course, these findings come out in favor of insurance companies, which the IIHS represents, since insurers commonly charge more to insure SUVs than small cars and minivans.
Mr. Retting worked for 20 years for the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, or IIHS, an insurance-industry-funded group, where he published several studies finding safety benefits from red-light cameras.
The potential for injuries are measured using smaller dummies because IIHS data suggests that women are more likely than men to suffer serious head injuries in a side impact collision.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), which performs its own crash testing and ratings, takes a hard-line stand: It does not recommend any small cars or SUVs for younger drivers.
The IIHS estimates that such roofs reduce the risk of serious and fatal injury in single-vehicle rollovers by about 50 percent compared with those that merely meet the federal minimum requirement for crush resistance.
Minivans appeared the safest based on the IIHS study, with a death rate of just 25 per million registered vehicles in that category compared with an average 48 driver deaths per million registered vehicles in 2006 through 2009 across all model types with the model years 2005 to 2008.
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