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All drivers -- yes, every one of them -- engage in
some kind of distracting activity while they are driving, according to research
funded by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety and performed by the University
of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center. And while cell phones are
the distraction people love to hate, other distractions were far more prevalent
and could be more hazardous.
In the first such study of its kind, researchers used
in-car video cameras to see how drivers behaved when they were behind the wheel
of their own cars. The tapes showed that distraction is an everyday occurrence:
Over three hours of driving, all of the drivers were distracted at some point,
90% by something outside the car and 100% by something inside the vehicle.
The
following chart shows the percentage of drivers who engaged in the most common
distracting activities while driving:
|
|
% of Subjects |
% of Total Time |
| Reaching, leaning, etc |
97.1
|
3.8 |
| Manipulating music/audio controls |
91.4
|
1.4 |
| Eating, drinking, etc. |
71.4
|
4.6 |
| Conversing |
77.1
|
15.3 |
| Grooming |
45.7
|
0.3 |
| Passenger |
44.4
|
0.9 |
| Reading or writing |
40.0
|
0.7 |
| Using cell phone |
30.0
|
1.3 |
| Smoking |
7.1
|
1.6 |
“We found that people do adjust their behavior to
a certain extent,” says Peter Kissinger, President of the AAA Foundation for
Traffic Safety. “They have a tendency to do potentially distracting things
while their car is stopped.” Overall, vehicles were stopped an average of
15.3% of the time they were in use, yet 70% of reading and writing, 34% of grooming,
and 25% of cell phone use occurred while the vehicle was not moving.
“Around a quarter of all traffic crashes are caused
by distractions, which annually account for 1.2 million incidents,” Kissinger
says. “People often underestimate the seriousness of distractions because
not every distraction leads to a crash. But if you are distracted just when
someone pulls out in front of you, your lack of attention can be catastrophic.”
Research
performed by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety can be found at http://www.aaafoundation.org/resources/index.cfm?button=research
. The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety is an independent, publicly funded,
501 (c)(3) charitable research and educational organization that was established
in 1947 by the American Automobile Association. The AAA Foundation’s mission
is to prevent traffic deaths and injuries by conducting research into their
causes and by educating the public about strategies to prevent crashes.
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