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[Asherdan]

[wombat]

I have to somewhat reluctantly approve of this idea. When people just talked on the phone while driving it was bad enough, but now that I know there are people stupid enough to think they can text and drive at the same time, something has to be done.

[theinevitable]

this is probably a good idea.

I guess I'd have to pull out the ol' ipod so I could listen to music.

...also, I guess it would piss me off to not be able to look up directions on my iphone.
Yeah, that would piss me off a whole ton.

[AugustWest]

I guess I'm in favor of it for texting, but not voice, at least if you're talking hands-free.  I mean, if you can hold a conversation with a passenger actually in the vehicle, why should a hands-free conversation be any different.

[theinevitable]

When I was a Psychology major we read studies that said that it is really different holding a conversation on the phone than it is talking to a passenger. There were different theories about why, but for some reason when you are on the phone you go into "phone-mode" or something. Another theory was that a passenger in the car will pay attention to what is going on and stop talking if you're, like, about to skid off the road. (whoever did this study has never driven with small children.)

[wombat]

Hands free phones are NOT safer. It is NOT the same as holding a conversation with a passenger.

6  Are hands-free cellphones safer?

    No, at least not after the conversation begins. Both studies of crashes using cellphone billing records to verify phone use found about a fourfold increase in crash risk with conversing on both hands-free and hand-held phones.

http://www.iihs.org/research/qanda/cellphones.aspx

Lots more information here.
http://www.cartalk.com/ddc/info/resources-facts.php

HANG UP AND DRIVE.

[greenkoolayd]

what if theres an emergency and you have to call 911, or call someone else for help?

they have a smartphone app that can detect when the phone is moving at at least 15 mph and can send an automatic, 'im driving, so give me a fuckin break' text or autoreply to phone calls with a recorded message.

[side_show]

I'm more for legislation making it illegal to talk/text and drive than for scrambling devices.  We have this law locally, and I agree with it, although I wish it also included hands free devices, which it doesn't. 

The phenomenon inev is talking about is called Inattentional Blindness.  Here's a fun article related to it from the NY Times. 

As for scrambling devices, I'm opposed, as there are enough emergency scenarios where a phone is a valuable tool to use while driving.  Plus, what about passengers who want to use phones?  I've had plenty of experiences where a teenager is quietly texting or talking on a cell in a back seat unnoticed by me to know that such activity actually makes driving easier.

[Nabubrush]

I guess I'm in favor of it for texting, but not voice, at least if you're talking hands-free.  I mean, if you can hold a conversation with a passenger actually in the vehicle, why should a hands-free conversation be any different.

In addition to the point made about how hands-free is not like conversing with a passenger who is in the vehicle, many people turn to look at their passengers while they talk to them, which is not such a bang-up idea.

Of course, with the amount of people who drive aging pieces of shit, this is going to take quite a while to affect a majority of the population, I'd think.

[greenkoolayd]

It seems logical that many states have enacted traffic regulations against texting while driving, but they are fruitless.

These laws are hard to enforce, much like the prohibition

People who continue to text and drive often avoid detection by looking down into their laps in order to read text messages.  Since their devices aren’t at eye level, their eyes and attention are off the road and other motorists for longer periods of time.  The laws don’t take these practices into consideration.

“Texting bans haven’t reduced crashes at all, “says Adrian Lund, President of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

It has been sad that someone who is driving and texting at the same time has a reaction time similar to one who is driving while intoxicated.  “Lon Anderson, mid-Atlantic spokesman for AAA, said it would take time for public opinion to get behind the distracted driving campaign
‘It took a couple of decades before people recognized the problem of drunk driving,’ he said. ‘We need to have a sea change on the part of drivers on this issue.’”

[Choop]

just another reason to keep buying used cars. regardless, an aftermarket disabling device will show up on ebay for under three hundred bucks.

[littlefallsmets]

I think what it comes down to is...

There are people who shouldn't be driving with any distractions and there are people who are probably safe drivers with a moderate amount of distractions and...

There is almost no way of sifting those people out from each other effectively.

So we almost kinda have to play down to the distractable by default.

[wombat]

"There are people who are probably safe drivers with distractions" is actually the most dangerous assumption, because EVERYONE thinks that they are the exception.

The reason doing other things while driving is dangerous has to do with fundamental properties of how the brain works. For example, the brain can't pay full attention to both visual and auditory information:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-06/jhu-myc062105.php

If there are people who are better at doing two things at once, the number is so small as to be irrelevant. For example, one study found that one in forty people are better than normal at multitasking (not neccessarily while driving):
http://chronicle.com/blogs/tweed/you-probably-think-this-studys-about-you/22125

Yet the roads are like Lake Woboegon: EVERYONE thinks that they are an above average driver. People convince themselves that it's OK if they do it, even if other people shouldn't.

[wombat]

We shouldn't have a thread like this without noting that science, which we need more of, says that driving and cell-phoning is at least as dangerous as driving drunk, if not moreso.

Drivers who use hand-held devices are four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves. (Source: Insurance Institute for Highway Safety)

Using a cell phone use while driving, whether it’s hand-held or hands-free, delays a driver's reactions as much as having a blood alcohol concentration at the legal limit of .08 percent. (Source: University of Utah

http://distraction.gov/stats-and-facts/index.html

When controlling for driving conditions and time on task, cell-phone drivers exhibited greater impairment than intoxicated drivers.

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=570222

And don't forget, again:

The available research indicates that whether it is a hands-free or hand-held device, the cognitive distraction is significant enough to degrade a driver’s performance. The driver is more likely to miss key visual and audio cues needed to avoid a crash.

http://distraction.gov/faq/#04

[AugustWest]

We shouldn't have a thread like this without noting that science, which we need more of, says that driving and cell-phoning is at least as dangerous as driving drunk, if not moreso.
http://distraction.gov/stats-and-facts/index.html
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=570222

And don't forget, again:http://distraction.gov/faq/#04

Education.