Recently while driving from New York to Pennsylvania, I suddenly realized I had taken the wrong exit for the New Jersey Turnpike.
For me it was a startling mistake that had me going north instead of south, and added at least a half hour to my commute. It had happened while I was talking to a friend on the phone. Even though I had been using a headset and had both hands on the wheel, I still made an important driving error.
Beyond my driving mistake, there are plenty of data to show that cellphone conversations and driving don’t mix. My Well column in Tuesday’s Science Times explores the science of cellphones and driving, and helps explain why even hands-free cellphone use takes a toll on your driving ability. Now the National Safety Council has called for a total ban on cellphone use while driving.
Read the full story, “A Problem of the Brain, Not the Hands: Group Urges Phone Ban for Drivers,” and then join the discussion below. Are you willing to give up your hands-free cellphone calls during your driving time?
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Oh, dear god! When you said “I suddenly realized I was driving in the wrong direction on the New Jersey Turnpike” I thought you meant you were driving directly into oncoming traffic!
From your lack of alarm, I assume you meant you got on the highway going the wrong way?
Yes, talking on the phone while driving, whether hands-free or not, clearly distracts and adds danger to the driver, the passengers, and everyone else on the road.
What I want to know is… what *realistic* solutions are out there?
Peter Steinberg
http://www.FlashlightWorthyBooks.com
Recommending books so good, they’ll keep you up past your bedtime.
— Peter SteinbergFROM TPP — Oh dear, I see how it could be interpreted that way. I changed it to make it clear I was heading north instead of south.
How is using a hands free any different then talking with someone in your car - if anything the passenger would be more distracting. BAN Passengers!!!!!
FROM TPP — Read the article — just the opposite is true. Passengers make you safer.
— controlfreaksareusPassengers, unlike people on the phone with you, have a vested interest in and are able to point out unsafe situations to the driver.
I can always spot drivers on the phone — they are six inches from my bumper, speeding, and swerving all over the road. Sort of like a drunk driver, come to think of it!
— SharonA reader asks “How is using a hands free any different than talking with someone in your car? The answer is simple when the passenger is a competent adult — the someone in your car is an extra pair of eyes and ears. I am a board certified preventive medicine physician who has naturally been observing behavior in the cars I have driven and driven in over the years. On more than one occassion an alert passenger has pointed out a problem missed by the driver. I have also noticed in driving with teenage non or inexperienced drivers in the car that they don’t provide the same benefit to the driver. Rather than calling out a legimate problem for a driver to attend to, they will point out things that should be ignored and distract the driver. I believe this is the reason that the risk of accidents go up with an increase in teen passengers and teen drivers but not with older more experienced drivers and their passengers. The bottom line - passengers are distracting but they also improve driving by increasing the aggregate ability to detect problems.
— Ginny_DThe solution is so simple — nearly all cell phones now have GPS technology embedded so service providers should make cell phones inoperable when the phone is moving at more than 10 miles per hour. At minimum texting should not work, it could be easily applied to state laws enacted (i.e., cross the border and cell phone no longer works while driving), it could become a safe driver credit program (i.e., $ off insurance when opted in to cell service). The cell companies would ultimately be seen as heroes, we would have to actually pull over to use our phones or at least to text. So what if passengers are inconvenienced — we had no cell service in our cars for decades and survived! As someone guilty of chatting/texting while drivingwith a teenager coming up to driving age, it’s worth it!!!!
— KrokayThis is so fundamental….that people, willing to admit it to themselves, KNOW it’s true. Multi-tasking of any kind doesn’t really work, in the sense that at least one, if not all simultaneous activities are compromised. Come on, we all know that, if we’re being honest.
I know that people feel entitled to their cell phones at all times, because we have virtually organized our lives around mobile communication. And if people would restrict themselves to “hello, I’ll be home soon,” or “yes, I’ll pick up some milk,” there wouldn’t be any problem. But they don’t. They engage in full-out conversations, probably more intently than if they were somewhere else, because they perceive that the time in the car is “dead time.” Driving is inherently boring, so we’re tempted to engage fully in a conversation.
I don’t know how a ban on hands-free phone talking could be enforced, but presumably records would be used against people for criminal cases and lawsuits, when accidents occur.
What I do know, is that this is something that must be addressed. People will hate it, but they also hated to hear they needed to give up smoking, that they had to stop smoking in public places, and that they had to wear seat belts. With time, all of these behaviors were changed a great deal, partly via laws and partly as a result of pervasive social pressure.
— WesleyI was walking my dog the other day when a car came towards me getting slower and slower as it passed I could see the young driver TEXTING! So then there was the guy in front of me today…taking a picture of the sunset while driving! Cell phones cause a lot more distraction than just talking.
— TerriThere’s so much money in the business of cell phones.
And people seem to have an infantile attachment to them and will lash out at any suggestion that their use should be curtailed–see comment at 10:19 pm.
It’s because of these two reasons that a large swath of our population wants to close their eyes to the problem.
How many times have you looked ahead and seen a car that didn’t seem quite under control, as if there was no consciousness there–pull up alongside and you see the driver is talking on a cell phone.
Of course talking to a passenger is different! Observe a person on the street talking to a friend next to them–they look around, at the person, away . . . Now observe a person on the street talking on a cell phone–they could walk right by their own mother and not see her.
Additionally, there’s an understanding with a passenger that the conversation can lapse and the passenger will understand why you have stopped talking or paused–e.g., you are close in with another car–but with a phone conversation, the moment you don’t respond or lapse, it will be Hello? Hello? are you there? That’s why people are so locked into a phone conversation and it’s so distracting.
— AgeePeople in a phone conversation are VERY tuned into whether they have the other person’s full attention and vice versa.
The only time I use my cell phone when I’m driving is to tell people when I’m going to be significantly late due to traffic. (In my view, being 15 minutes late isn’t that late, but being 30 minutes late is pretty inconvenient.)
Maybe cell phone providers should introduce an automated voice reply service, which says something like:
“If you’re calling because you’re wondering where I am, press 1.”
Caller presses 1.
“I’m currently at location X and I will arrive at location Y at approximately time T.”
— BrianI drive and use my cell phone constantly (and I drive a lot–25-30K miles per year. I believe I drive and safely and well–organized speed dialing and turn it off in unsafe conditions. However, I watch the bizarre behavior around me and I believe it’s out of control. I’m ready for mine to go back to the briefcase in favor of safer driving all around. That should include eating while driving too!!!
FROM TPP — The data on cell phone safety show that 98% of the people who use cell phones have degraded driving as a result, so only @% of the population really can pull off driving and cell phone talking at the same time. Problem is, most of us think we fall into that 2%.
— cbI wonder how talking on a hands-free cell phone is any different than a pilot on a plane talking with controllers on the ground to the brain?
— Chuck StaplesGreat story! I’ve only been saying this for years. Nothing wrong in pulling off the road to use the cell phone if it is imperative to make or take that call “right now”. And to think, there was a time, in perspective, not all that long ago, when we would have to use a roadside pay phone to let people know we were running late, or pull off the highway to go to a gas station or store to ask for directions.
— Diane GWhat about radios being a distraction…or eating…or smoking…or drinking….or a baby crying in his/her carseat? I mean SERIOUSLY there are many many many distractions. Are we to ban them all? I speak with my children in the backseat all of the time while driving and they are not helping me with my driving skills. Let me guess, no more kids in the car? This is all ridiculous. I have an idea. You want to make an impact and legislate something worthwhile? Read on…..
BAN SMOKING in front of, in the vacinity of, or on the same planet as CHILDREN!! You want to give someone a better quality of life, DO THAT. It is called right to quiet enjoyment, and that is taken away EVERY SINGLE TIME someone lights up around me, my kids, and anyone that chooses to breath clean air. Make smokers close all their doors and windows in their homes, their cars, etc, and let them smell it all. Give them the double whammy of ingesting the original damage along with the second-hand smoke damage. They will also get the benefit of dying sooner (because they are getting all of the fumes and taking in the carcinogens), and not of making others sick with their second-hand smoke, which is proven to be more dangerous than actually smoking the gross cigarette in the first place.
Smoking around children is CHILD ABUSE plain and simple, and we allow this every day. Inexcusable and unacceptable. I know, because I grew up in this environment and it is ABUSE.
Now THAT is something we really need to be working towards.
Krissy Saunders
— KrissyGiven that driving is probably the most dangerous thing the average person does on a regular basis, it’s amazing that driving and talking on a phone has been legal this long.
I have a game I play on the road. When someone’s obviously driving impaired I try and figure out if they’re drunk or on the phone. A majority are on the phone.
— MikeKrikay’s idea seems good until you realise that I can’t then use my cell phone when I’m a passenger. So what says Krokay. Well, I really like to feel that my wife, for example, is able to ring 911 to report the mad insane SUV driver desperately trying to run my off the road as he (it’s never a woman - have you noticed ?) attempts to pass me on the inside as the right lane ends and slide between me and the truck ahead who’s already braking hard, resulting in a less-than-car-sized gap between us.
Of course, I’m also often scared by the soccer mums in their mini-vans turning left as I wait first-in-line at a red light to do the same. They swing past me in manic concentration, using only their left hands to steer in a left-turn, as their right hands are already in use, clutching cell-phones to their ears as they get the latest scores from little Jimmy’s indoor soccer game.
These people need to appear on the BBC’s Top Gear program as guest drivers, not be allowed on the open roads !
— Mike IrwinOOPs, you’re not thinking. Are you talking on your cell while you write? Then cell phones wouldn’t work on public transport, in taxis, trains, buses or for passengers.
— LoriDavid Strayer’s study on cell phones and driving confirms what I have always suspected: that people talking on cell phones are in a world of their own and do not pay adequate attention to their surroundings. However, it isn’t necessary to study drivers to see this in action. Just spend some time watching pedestrians walking down the street or supermarket aisles. They will walk right into you, like your not even there. Why? Perhaps, as the article suggests, because their brains are so busy creating an image of the person they are talking to, that their eyes and ears do not register what is in front of them.
— -David_RUltimately, we need—and will see the return of the phone booth (or some variation thereof), as this is not just a problem in driving. Try riding “shotgun’ with a bus driver sometime, and you’ll see pedestrians on cellphones obliviously walk right out in front of a moving bus, you’ll hear conversations ranging from the most intimate and revealing to the most annoying and gross, and you’ll see precarious bicyclists wobble in the midst of rush-hour traffic—all with that fixed straight-ahead stare, all for the sake of prioritizing the phone call that removes their attention from the reality right in front of them. They are also oblivious to the amount of personal information they reveal or to the effect they have on the comfort and well-being of others.
— Barbara DI meant to say “pedestrian cellphone users”
— David_ROne of the reasons passengers are safer than phones is probably that passengers pace the conversation with the driving situation. For example, a passenger would probably not ask a question like, ’so… where do you think our relationship is going?’ in the middle of a high-speed, challenging merge. Someone on the other end of the phone just might.
I think there’s a VERY low probability that a cell ban would be passed. Ignoring the probability that people would just balk at idea, the law would be almost impossible to enforce. How can you tell if someone is talking on a hands-free phone? Even the bans in NY on ‘regular’ cellphone use are hardly enforced.
— KaglanWhen there is an accident, the driver’s phone number should be made available, phone records searched, then he could be sued for reckless driving.
Drivers going thru red lights, hitting, and almost hitting pedestrians, and cyclists is a common occurence, in NYC because there are still people are busy chatting on their phones while driving.
Cell phones are a great convenience, but we should realize the potential for accidents.
— Mark StylesPeople don’t even interact with REAL people anymore. It amazes me the tasks people feel they must accomplish while having their ears glued to their cell phones: grocery shopping, pumping gas, standing in checkouts, and of course, driving. I don’t even think people THINK anymore, they just constantly blare out all interior processes by incessantly talking on their cell phones. No more friendly conversations with other people in line, no more interacting with customers, no more actually taking stock of where you are and what you are doing. Everyone has to constantly be whiling away their lives jabbering to or texting some unseen person they probably don’t even visit anymore because they are always on the phone to one another! I think that cell phones should be banned if you are moving at all! They have crossed the line from useful device, to social disease.
— NurisimThe solution is to take licenses away from the majority of you drivers out there. Whether on the phone, talking to a passenger, stuffing your face, or just plain driving … you are terrible. We need more stringent testing standards that get you uncoordinated, irrational, emotional fools off of our highways and roads. Learn to merge! Learn to distinguish speed differentials! Learn smooth control and learn to PAY ATTENTION! It’s called situational awareness and a cross-check … do it.
— Kurt CarterWhat is the difference between talking on a hands free kit and talking to another person in the car? Not to mention that everyone has a tendancy to look at the person they are talking to. Are they going to try ban conversation in cars all together?
The logisical issue of policing such behaviour is rediculous.
FROM TPP — All I can say is read the article. All these issues are addressed. Passengers are not a bigger risk.
— Garron Dace\
I have to say, read Krissy’s comment at 11.21 P.M. and saw red. Krissy, please read the article and start educating yourself before spouting such nonsense.
As for the anti-smoking comment, as a lifelong NON smoker married to another, I agree with you, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with the topic under discussion, and trying to change the subject of the real dangers all cellphone drivers pose to others on the road is not adding constructively to the conversation here. I am getting sick and tired of cellphone drivers making excuses for themselves while driving under similar impairments as drunk drivers.
As a lawyer, I have a proposal. Presumption of absolute liability for anyone involved in a traffic accident while talking on a cellphone–and I mean anyone, bicylists, drivers or pedestrians–if all parties to the accident are so impaired, then that can be taken into account at the trial. Talking on the cellphone should be considered as actionable as driving drunk. If you are caught, you lose your license under the same conditions. If you kill someone, it is negligent homicide or manslaughter. Insurance policies should be adjusted accordingly. I support any device which automatically disables cell phones in moving vehicles. (If you are stuck in a traffic jam and can’t move, I have no problem with you talking away to your heart’d delight.) As for their not working in trains, planes and other places where rude people constantly subject others to their conversations, all the better, although I admit that is not necessary for safety requirement.
Your time and convenience is not worth my life or the life of my family and friends. If you need to talk, pull over and get off the road.
— slw