Connecticut, New York and New Jersey all prohibit drivers from yakking on a cell without a hands-free device. A new study of 902 tri-state drivers commissioned by Parrot, a Texas-based manufacturer of said technology, reveals that 72 percent of these mobile mobile users now own a hands-free device. Now the bad news: only 14 percent of them use the equipment religiously (regardless of denomination). Jersey drivers are the worst offenders; 43 percent of their in-car calls are held via the handset. "The challenge of hands-free compliance is not only perception but also reality,” says the irony-loving Ed Valdez, president and COO of Parrot. “The reality is that the majority of tri-state drivers are still using their hand-held cell phones because they don't perceive that the law applies to them.” Reflecting the “it’s the other guy who’s driving sucks” gestalt, the debate over the statistical danger of cell phone distracted drivers (as opposed to tiredness, children, food, etc.) continues. Meanwhile, anecdotal evidence of cell-related tragedies– such as this morning’s report in the Houston Chronicle— sustains the momentum for outright bans against drivers using hand-held cells.
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They miss the point that hands-free doesn’t seem to be any safer than hand-held cell phone use:
“Motorists who use cell phones while driving are four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves, according to a study of drivers in Perth, Australia, conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. The results, published in July, 2005, suggest that banning hand-held phone use won’t necessarily improve safety if drivers simply switch to hand-free phones. The study found that injury crash risk didn’t vary with type of phone.
Many studies have shown that using hand-held cell phones while driving can constitute a hazardous distraction. However, the theory that hands-free sets are safer has been challenged by the findings of several studies. A study from researchers at the University of Utah, published in the summer 2006 issue of Human Factors, the quarterly journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, concludes that talking on a cell phone while driving is as dangerous as driving drunk, even if the phone is a hands-free model. An earlier study by researchers at the university found that motorists who talked on hands-free cell phones were 18 percent slower in braking and took 17 percent longer to regain the speed they lost when they braked. “
http://www.iii.org/media/hottopics/insurance/cellphones/
If cell phone usage was truly the equivalent of drunk driving, then fatality rates should be climbing faster than a hot single up the pop charts.
But they’re not. Despite the gloom and doom, fatality rates keep falling steadily, a statistical behavior that should not be occurring if a phone was equal to a few shots of bourbon.
But wait, there’s more. Many countries have banned them, yet have not seen any benefit in their fatality rates, either. Surely, if this menace to society was banned from their highways that they should have seen outstanding results from it? Well, apparently not.
This phone=death thing is the next installment of the Speed Kills…Oops, Trust Me, It Does Even Though We Can’t Prove It syndrome. This is one of those areas in which we have enough real world data that it should become evident soon enough whether phones are problematic or not based upon crash data, but no such data seems to exist.
Just as raising US speed limits above 55 mph was supposed to turn us into a nation of cripples but didn’t, so this same non-phenomenon has shown itself to be the case with phones. If the laboratory data can’t be demonstrated in the real world, then it’s time to get a new test tube.
Hands free or not, another study conducted some years ago by AAA found that talking on the cell phone while driving was just as distracting and operationally-impairing/ as likely to contribute to an accident as was eating while driving, reading while driving, and even driving while legally intoxicated. All of the above still occur, regardless of legislation, and will continue to do so.
“The natural effort of every individual to better his own condition is so powerful a principle, that it alone, and without any assistance, not only capable of carrying on the society to wealth and prosperity, but of surmounting a hundred impertinent obstructions with which the folly of human laws too often incumbers its operations”
–Adam Smith
in “Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”
Pch101 :
October 4th, 2007 at 10:23 am
If cell phone usage was truly the equivalent of drunk driving, then fatality rates should be climbing faster than a hot single up the pop charts.
Unless of course it is being balance off by better and safer cars.
I can totally believe the results of that study. Driving should take the vast majority of your concentration. People turn down the radio when looking for a destination in an unfamiliar area. Why? Because brains are not good multi-taskers.
I wonder what the results of the study would be for having a conversation with the passenger in the car. Is there a difference between that and a person on the other end of the phone?
But wait, there’s more. Many countries have banned them, yet have not seen any benefit in their fatality rates, either. Surely, if this menace to society was banned from their highways that they should have seen outstanding results from it? Well, apparently not.
Drunk driving doesn’t really show up either. They claim stats like 50% of fatalities involve alcohol, but all that means is that someone within 50 meters of the accident has had a drink in the last 24 hours. You have a beer at dinner and then get into an accident 6 hours later, that becomes an alcohol related accident. GIGO.
Hi Glenn,
It does not matter much, but Parrot ain’t from Texas, they are from FRANCE. Curious to read if there are similar results with Citroen and Renault drivers around Nice.