The AAA Foundation has released a new report about distracted driving, one that measures the relative distraction of hand held vs. hands free electronic devices in cars. The study can be found at https://www.aaafoundation.org/sites/default/files/MeasuringCognitiveDistractions.pdf. The unsurprising but well documented conclusion: not much difference in the level of distraction. The gist of the research is that talking on a phone with someone not in the vehicle is distracting, causing what is called “cognitive blindness.” The driver may think he or she is multi-tasking, but human awareness is more of a zero-sum game; when a driver is engaged in conversation requiring any type of thought, it’s not multi-tasking that’s going on, but switching from one task, driving , to another, participating in the conversation. And while drivers are conscious of the distractions when they take their eyes off the road or hands off the wheel, cognitive blindness is insidious because drivers do not comprehend that they are being distracted from the traffic situation.
I recently wrote about distracting electronics and safer teen driving in an op-ed published in the Hartford Courant last month, http://www.courant.com/news/opinion/hc-op-hollister-electronic-devices-should-be-banne-20130531,0,2727873.story. My points for parents: First, electronic distraction of teen drivers adds to the already substantial risks they face, and a zero tolerance family policy for not only texting but use of electronics — yes, easier said than done – is essential. Second, adults who supervise teen drivers need to consider whether they can send an effective message to teen drivers about texting and other distracting behavior when they themselves use more and more distracting elections in their own cars. Third, each state would do well to look at simplifying its electronic distraction laws, which often go on for pages and pages with definitions that try – but fail — to keep up with evolving technology, and are laden with exceptions for things like navigation/GPS and audio, which with the array of buttons and number of steps required in many vehicles are as distracting as texting. In my view, distraction is distraction; pushing buttons and reading screens is mind-off-the-situation, no matter what the device. The new AAA Foundation report seems to provide empirical evidence to support this view.

Researchers at the George Institute for Global Health in Australia, writing in the American Medical Association journal JAMA Pediatrics, report the results of a large study about teen drivers crashes and the number of hours of sleep the drivers got on average during the month prior to the crash. They found that those who slept on average less than six hours per night were 21 percent more likely to have been in a crash. They also found that the crash rate was 55 percent higher on weekends.




But with the acknowledgement that the following does NOT apply to teens, one speaker at Lifesavers explained why talking to a passenger is less distracting than talking to someone on a cellphone. First, a passenger who is an experienced driver actually can provide some modest benefit as an extra pair of eyes on the road. Second, a passenger knows when to stop talking, because he or she can see when the driving situation requires the driver’s full attention, which someone on a cellphone cannot. Third, studies have now shown that it is more cognitively challenging to talk to someone who is not in the car than it is to a passenger. In other words, a driver and a passenger talking are “in sync” as to the driving situation, but a driver and a cellphone caller are not. A caller has no idea when the driver needs to switch attention back to the traffic situation, and might in fact say something that requires careful thought — cognitive distraction — at just the wrong time.
There have been some studies and reports about teens delaying getting licensed until age 18, to avoid the restrictions and requirements of Graduated Driver Licensing laws, and some evidence of crash rates for 18 and 19 year olds going up as a result. A session led by Bruce Hamilton of the AAA Foundation and Scott Masten of the California DMV shed some light on this topic.