Texting And Driving Research Paper
Useful yet Dangerous With modern day technology there many devices that can lead to distractions, such as cell phones. Everyone one from the smallest second grader to an elderly person, pretty much use cell phones these days. The majority of people have switched from having a house line to just having cell phones for everyone in their household, but they have become a major topic of tongue with texting and talking while being on the road. You can find many reasons as to why texting and talking can be very life threatening when driving your vehicle. Either way, you may be threatening your life, and the people that surround you. Although cell phones are most convenient for talking and texting to someone, are they really worth the risk of
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using them while you drive? According to a December report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), “[a]n estimated 10 percent of drivers on American roads are using some type of Cell phone or communication device at any given time” (Arias).
Just this ten percent can cause major traffic accidents and even slow it down due to drivers unaware of the environment. Banning cell phone use in the automobile would bring about some tension among the people who say they need their phone in the car. However, when looking at both sides, we need to decide what is more important: a simple conversation or someone’s life? Cell phone use in the car is just as dangerous as drunk driving. “[W]hether it’s hand-held or hands-free, [it] delays a driver 's reactions as much as having a blood alcohol concentration at the legal limit of .08 percent” (Statistics and Facts About Distracted Driving). A person on the phone may get distracted or carried away with the conversation, making it a dangerous drive. When on the phone, people do not look carefully and do not notice their surroundings. Instead, they are fixated on the conversation that they are having with the person on the other side of the line. Many collisions and even deaths have resulted from this careless behavior. There have been “32,000 traffic accidents caused by distracted drivers,” says The AAA Foundation of Traffic Safety that released a study by the University of North Carolina Highway …show more content…
Safety Research Center (Thierer). Some advocates of phone use in the car, say that headsets using Bluetooth or other hands-free calling devices lessen collisions. According to Distraction.gov, Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says that “[d]rivers [ . . . ] [that] use hand-held devices are four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves.” However, the truth is that it does not lessen much. Studies show that driving with the phone up to your head or calling from a hand-free device produce about the same results. Although hands are free while using headsets, the focus of one’s attention is not on the road, but once again, on a conversation. Distraction.gov, lists three of the major distraction categories: visual, manual, and cognitive. While using a physical phone uses all three categories of distraction, the headset uses one. However, this one is just as important as the other two. When using a headset the “Cognitive” category of distraction is used meaning that one is “taking [their] mind off what [they are] doing (Statistics and Facts About Distracted Driving). Because the conversation is the center of their attention, drivers are only using reflexive driving. This means one is only using the skills that are innate or second nature to them, while their sharpness for safety and careful driving are temporarily put in the back of their brain. Some states in the United States have officially banned the use of cell phones in the car. However, not all states have called action to this problem. There are many states in which laws against cell phone use have not been established. Talking and texting while in the car is the cause of many accidents and deaths. In order to save lives and avoid large amounts of spending over avoidable accidents, citizens and the government should take the initiative and ban cell phone use while driving in all states. According to the table Sundeen has to offer us, Texas being highest in the cell phone factor, had one thousand thirty-two reported accidents. However, Tennessee was the lowest of the states to have crashes regarding the cell phone factor, which was only seven by the way (Sundeen).
There have also been discussions on subjects dealing with the matter of age.
In example, “[y]oung drivers who use cell phones at the wheel drive like the elderly – with slower reaction time and an increased risk of accidents” (Handwerk). But then why do we let the elderly drive you might ask yourself? Strayer at University of Utah said, “If you put a 20-year-old driver behind the wheel with a cell phone, their reaction times are the same as a 70-year-old driver who is not using a cell phone” (Handwerk). The fact is that even though we allow 70-year-olds to drive, by taking cell phones out of the car, 20-year -olds will not have a slow reaction time, therefore, reducing the number reaction
delays.
Texting is even more dangerous than calling someone, which is all the more reason not to use a cell phone while driving. Looking down or away from the road to read a text message makes driving unsafe. Imagine driving with a person with a blind fold around their eyes for five seconds. In five seconds, many things can happen. A person can unknowingly go onto the next lane, miss a light, miss a stop sign, or not realize that a person has put on their breaks, or lose control of their car. All these actions can lead to serious consequences. If all of America decides to install laws banning cell phone use in the car, money, time spent at the scene of a car accident, and most importantly deaths can be avoided.
Works Cited
Arias, Donya C. "Rate of cell phone use while driving on rise" Nation 's Health 36.1 (2006): 22-22.
Handwerk, Brian. “Young cell Phone Users Drive Like Elderly, Study Says.” National Geographic News 2 Feb. 2005. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005.
Statistics and Facts About Distracted Driving. n.d. 6 December 2010 .
Sundeen, Matt. “Cell Phone and Highway Safety: 2005 Legislative Update,” July 2005. http://www.ncsl/org/programs/transportation/cellphoneupdate05.html.
Thierer, Adam. “Beware of the Cellular Keystone Cops.” In “Tech Knowledge” 9 May 2001. http://www.cato.org/tech/tk/010509-tk.html.
using them while you drive? According to a December report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), “[a]n estimated 10 percent of drivers on American roads are using some type of Cell phone or communication device at any given time” (Arias).
Just this ten percent can cause major traffic accidents and even slow it down due to drivers unaware of the environment. Banning cell phone use in the automobile would bring about some tension among the people who say they need their phone in the car. However, when looking at both sides, we need to decide what is more important: a simple conversation or someone’s life? Cell phone use in the car is just as dangerous as drunk driving. “[W]hether it’s hand-held or hands-free, [it] delays a driver 's reactions as much as having a blood alcohol concentration at the legal limit of .08 percent” (Statistics and Facts About Distracted Driving). A person on the phone may get distracted or carried away with the conversation, making it a dangerous drive. When on the phone, people do not look carefully and do not notice their surroundings. Instead, they are fixated on the conversation that they are having with the person on the other side of the line. Many collisions and even deaths have resulted from this careless behavior. There have been “32,000 traffic accidents caused by distracted drivers,” says The AAA Foundation of Traffic Safety that released a study by the University of North Carolina Highway …show more content…
Safety Research Center (Thierer). Some advocates of phone use in the car, say that headsets using Bluetooth or other hands-free calling devices lessen collisions. According to Distraction.gov, Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says that “[d]rivers [ . . . ] [that] use hand-held devices are four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves.” However, the truth is that it does not lessen much. Studies show that driving with the phone up to your head or calling from a hand-free device produce about the same results. Although hands are free while using headsets, the focus of one’s attention is not on the road, but once again, on a conversation. Distraction.gov, lists three of the major distraction categories: visual, manual, and cognitive. While using a physical phone uses all three categories of distraction, the headset uses one. However, this one is just as important as the other two. When using a headset the “Cognitive” category of distraction is used meaning that one is “taking [their] mind off what [they are] doing (Statistics and Facts About Distracted Driving). Because the conversation is the center of their attention, drivers are only using reflexive driving. This means one is only using the skills that are innate or second nature to them, while their sharpness for safety and careful driving are temporarily put in the back of their brain. Some states in the United States have officially banned the use of cell phones in the car. However, not all states have called action to this problem. There are many states in which laws against cell phone use have not been established. Talking and texting while in the car is the cause of many accidents and deaths. In order to save lives and avoid large amounts of spending over avoidable accidents, citizens and the government should take the initiative and ban cell phone use while driving in all states. According to the table Sundeen has to offer us, Texas being highest in the cell phone factor, had one thousand thirty-two reported accidents. However, Tennessee was the lowest of the states to have crashes regarding the cell phone factor, which was only seven by the way (Sundeen).
There have also been discussions on subjects dealing with the matter of age.
In example, “[y]oung drivers who use cell phones at the wheel drive like the elderly – with slower reaction time and an increased risk of accidents” (Handwerk). But then why do we let the elderly drive you might ask yourself? Strayer at University of Utah said, “If you put a 20-year-old driver behind the wheel with a cell phone, their reaction times are the same as a 70-year-old driver who is not using a cell phone” (Handwerk). The fact is that even though we allow 70-year-olds to drive, by taking cell phones out of the car, 20-year -olds will not have a slow reaction time, therefore, reducing the number reaction
delays.
Texting is even more dangerous than calling someone, which is all the more reason not to use a cell phone while driving. Looking down or away from the road to read a text message makes driving unsafe. Imagine driving with a person with a blind fold around their eyes for five seconds. In five seconds, many things can happen. A person can unknowingly go onto the next lane, miss a light, miss a stop sign, or not realize that a person has put on their breaks, or lose control of their car. All these actions can lead to serious consequences. If all of America decides to install laws banning cell phone use in the car, money, time spent at the scene of a car accident, and most importantly deaths can be avoided.
Works Cited
Arias, Donya C. "Rate of cell phone use while driving on rise" Nation 's Health 36.1 (2006): 22-22.
Handwerk, Brian. “Young cell Phone Users Drive Like Elderly, Study Says.” National Geographic News 2 Feb. 2005. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005.
Statistics and Facts About Distracted Driving. n.d. 6 December 2010 .
Sundeen, Matt. “Cell Phone and Highway Safety: 2005 Legislative Update,” July 2005. http://www.ncsl/org/programs/transportation/cellphoneupdate05.html.
Thierer, Adam. “Beware of the Cellular Keystone Cops.” In “Tech Knowledge” 9 May 2001. http://www.cato.org/tech/tk/010509-tk.html.