
- Texting while driving versus undistracted driving drivers#
- Texting while driving versus undistracted driving driver#
While there are newer ways to dial, e.g., speed dialing substituting 1 number for 10 or by vocal commands, taking your eyes off the road remains a bad idea.įor those of us that cling to the need for conversation while driving there are at least two objections to this meta-analysis.
Texting while driving versus undistracted driving driver#
(Perhaps husbands are just paying more attention to the road out of driving concerns?) None the less, reaction times, lane position, speed and distance from the leading cars all were worse than driving without conversation – and again, the decrease in driver awareness and response resulted in more collisions.ĭialing the phone is not a good idea either, almost as dangerous as texting.


Texting while driving versus undistracted driving drivers#
Hands-free, when fully integrated into the car’s audio did allow drivers to keep both hands on the wheel but still reduced the driver’s awareness of the driving environment.Ĭonversations with passengers also degrade driver awareness in part, based on how engaging and thought-provoking the conversation is. All of these small changes resulted in increased “collisions with vehicles, pedestrians, and infrastructure.” With some minor differences, hands-free and hand-held phones demonstrated similar problems. Drivers engaged in conversation did not slow down or increase the distance between themselves and the car ahead of them. Also, scanning the environment was diminished, drivers looked less to the left and right and in rear view mirrors. They looked at a variety of driving-related behaviors including the perception of hazards highway speed and distance between cars, the position of the car within the lane and driver eye movements.Ĭell phone conversation does impact driving, with both a slower identification of hazards and a slower reaction time. 93 papers make up the meta-analysis, 106 experimental situations involving a little under 4,400 drivers. The studies had to have a baseline measuring of driving without conversation. They looked at studies examining driving performance, in traffic situations or scenarios, and more specifically at driving while talking – that includes all conversations, on the phone and with passengers. The analysis considered only experimental studies, no surveys or epidemiological reports.

A meta-analysis in the journal Human Factors updates what we know about using cell phones while driving. Using a cell phone while driving is considered bad form, 47 states ban texting, 15 states prohibit hand-held cell phone use, and oddly enough a few states restrict these bans only to novice drivers – presumably because multi-tasking is a skill we can learn.
