William Atkins
Tuesday, 02 December 2008 19:02
Science -
Health
Page 2 of 3
In fact, they found that talking on any cell phone, handheld or hand-free, slows the reactions times of teenagers and young adults to levels normally reserved for older people.
They also found that cell phone use in cars impairs drivers worse than drunk driving.
Strayer and his team also showed that hands-free cell phone drivers travel outside of their lanes and miss their intended exits much more than drivers that are only talking to their passenger.
They stated in the abstract to their paper,
“The results show that the number of driving errors was highest in the cell phone condition; in passenger conversations more references were made to traffic, and the production rate of the driver and the complexity of speech of both interlocutors dropped in response to an increase in the demand of the traffic.”
Dr. Strayer stated,
“The passenger adds a second set of eyes, and helps the driver navigate and reminds them where to go. When you take a look at the data, it turns out that a driver conversing with a passenger is not as impaired a driver talking on a cell phone.” [ABC News: “
Mobile Phones Distract Drivers More Than Passengers”]
Strayer added, "The difference between a cell phone conversation and passenger conversation is due to the fact that the passenger is in the vehicle and knows what the traffic conditions are like, and they help the driver by reminding them of where to take an exit and pointing out hazards.” [ABC News]
Videos of the experiment are found on page three.
