Close calls have become a habit for this hobbit... esp since most of the ones I end up in involves vehicles without working tail lights. Quite often the only way to know that the vehicle ahead of you has indeed stopped is to crash into it.
+1 to Motofool
Here is my list of precautions that might help basically
and then some...
1: Never stay fixed dead center of the vehicle ahead of you, weave about from time to time but remember to stay within your lane.
2: Before you change lanes the first thing you should do is to look beyond the car in front of you and confirm that there are no potentially hazardous gremlins or leprechauns that might callously jump into your lane causing the possibly unwary cager ahead of you to involuntarily brake check you
Then check your side mirrors and then n ONLY then! Look behind you before you change.
3: Familiarize yourself with the motorcycle safe zones while on the road. These are not impregnable bomb shelter type safe zones, just the statistically safer places to be as in a preventive measure to reduce the risk of injury in case of an accident. It varies from country to country based on road laws, speed limits and morons. I think someone already covered that part somewhere here on this forum.
4: Slow the f*** down at intersections, plan ahead and move to the slower corner of the road opposite to the turn in. The further away you are from the turn in, the more time you have to react and being at the corner reduces the chances of being run over from behind. Its one of those safe zone thingys, but worth mentioning since most of the accidents I've seen are the result of t-bones.
5: Stay noticeable and avoid lingering in the cager's blind spot. The easy way to do this is to look at the cager's rear view mirror. If you can see his/her eyes in it then you are in the right spot.