Are You Distracted While Driving?
March 11th, 2010
by Guest Blogger
[Today's guest blogger is Celeste from the FCC.]
As the mom of a teenager who will be driving soon, I naturally want to make sure my son stays safe. I want him to keep his eyes on the road. I don’t want him to get distracted and accidentally hurt himself or someone else.
According to AAA, nearly 50 percent of teens admit that texting while driving is dangerous. However, Students Against Destructive Driving (SADD), along with Liberty Mutual Insurance Group, also released data that 37 percent of teens continue to send and receive text messages in their moving vehicles anyway. Even though state laws increasingly deal with texting and talking while driving (for example, by legislating the use of hands-free sets), there’s still a ways to go in educating drivers of all ages about the dangers of these habits.
And education is, indeed, a key step to reduce distracted driving. There are articles, web sites, and videos that can assist you in becoming more informed and passing this information along to your children and others in your life. Check out the Federal Communication Commission’s Distracted Driving Page to learn more and get information you can use in your community. The web site also provides links to other agencies – including the Department of Transportation – and organizations that are involved in reducing distracted driving.
Changing behavior is not easy, but it starts with each of us. As for me, I’m striving to set an example for my son by putting away my cell phone and paying closer attention to the road when I’m behind the wheel. It’s a small but critical step in making the road safer for my son and those with whom he shares it. After all, kids may not always listen to their parents; but they do watch what we do.
Tags: driving, mobile phone safety, safety, texting, texting while driving
This entry was posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010 at 3:48 pm and is filed under For Kids, NCPW. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
80% percent of all rear end collisions (the most frequent vehicle accident) are caused by driver inattention, following too closely, external distraction (talking on cell phones, shaving, applying makeup, fiddling with the radio or CD player, texting, etc.) and poor judgment. I doubt if we’ll ever stop the madness so I got one of these sparebumper to protect my family and vehicle.
no its most dangers
We have an anti-texting law in California; however, it doesn’t prevent me from checking my “email” on my smart phone and multi tasking with my navigation and ipod. Wonder when they’ll revise this law.
I find that if i give my cell phone to my passanger that its less distracting and that they will take care of any calls or texts. If you dont have a passenger then i recomend puting your cell phone on silent and leaving it in the cup holder. Anything else that you find distracting take care of before you begin to drive.
Yes I am distracted, even if I am using a hands free unit. Your focus is away from the road and what is going on in front of you. Unfortunately I will continue to use my cell phone while driving until it becomes illegal.
I doubt if we’ll ever stop the madness so I got one of these sparebumper to protect my family and vehicle.