Nova Scotia News - TheChronicleHerald.ca
DRIVING while intoxicated has become such a social taboo that most people recognize the acronym DUI (driving under the influence) used by police and prosecutors, and rightly so. But according to a growing body of research and empirical observation, DWT is a potentially worse hazard than DUI, and should be just as socially unacceptable as driving drunk.
DWT? That would be "driving while texting" (sub-category: driving while tweeting) — the most pernicious of a variety of distempers afflicting our culture as a consequence of pandemic cellphone addiction.
According to a U.K. Transport Research Laboratory study, commissioned by the Royal Automobile Club Foundation, motorists sending text messages while driving are "significantly more impaired" than ones who drive drunk. The study showed texters’ reaction times deteriorated by 35 per cent, and a whopping 91 per cent decrease in steering ability, while similar studies of drunk driving indicate reaction time diminishment of about 12 per cent. By that measure, DWT is three times more dangerous than DUI, and should logically be treated as severely, if not more so, both under the law and in terms of social censure.
Another study conducted by the Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk, Va., presented to the Pediatric Academic Societies in May, found teens using a driving simulator while sending text messages or searching MP3 player menus changed speed, steered erratically, in some cases running over pedestrians, showing these behaviours clearly pose a danger to drivers themselves and others around them. Motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of death for people between 16 and 20, the most prolific texting demographic, with teenage drivers four times more likely to crash than older drivers even when not texting.
However, it appears that a major public consciousness-raising and education effort is in order. While drinking and driving is now pretty comprehensively considered inappropriate and intolerable, texting while driving is not, with an apparent disconnect between public conviction and behaviour. Reuters reported that while 83 per cent of respondents in a nationwide U.S. survey said DWT should be illegal, one-quarter of U.S. cellphone users admit to texting while driving.
Ongoing surveys by the U.S. National Highway Safety Administration show 85 per cent of all auto crashes and 65 per cent of all near-crashes result from distracted driving.
Laws banning texting behind the wheel are relatively rare as yet. Only a handful of U.S states have full or partial bans in place. In Canada, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador have banned the use of hand-held cellphones (which would include texting) behind the wheel, and B.C. is considering such a ban. However, while research data cited indicate that enacting laws making cellphone use while driving illegal is just as important as our now ubiquitous penalties for driving drunk, passing laws against vehicular texting may not in itself be enough.
A study conducted this year by mobile technology firm Vingo found some of the worst DWT offenders living in states where DWT is already banned or ban legislation is pending. In Tennessee, an alarming 42 per cent of drivers surveyed admitted to indulging, compared with a slightly less horrific 26 per cent of cellphone users nationwide. Vingo found 66 per cent of drivers aged 16 to 19, already the least experienced and most crash-prone cohort, admitted to driving while texting; and despite more states enacting bans and increased public awareness of high-profile accidents, people still drive while texting at the same rate as a year ago.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, automobile accidents are now the leading cause of death in women under the age of 35 — another cellphone-prolific, texting-oriented demographic.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has determined that using cellphones, even hands-free units (which are still legal in Nova Scotia) in voice mode, increases crash risk fourfold, and texting — which distracts visually, physically and cognitively — increases risk sixfold. The U.S. National Safety Council advocates banning all cellphone use by automobile operators, advising that the prudent course is to turn the ringer off and stash the phone somewhere out of reach before turning the ignition key.
Parents also need to get on the case. A survey by SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) and Liberty Mutual Insurance Group found 52 per cent of teens who say their parents would be unlikely to punish them for driving while texting said they would continue doing so, compared with 36 per cent who believe their parents would penalize them.
The texting plague’s calamitous consequences transcend the operation of automobiles. Text-messaging was also identified as causing two recent public transit disasters — a train crash in Los Angeles that killed 25 people; and a 24-year-old subway operator in Boston admitting he’d been texting his girlfriend when he rammed his train into one ahead of him, injuring almost 50 people.
Just stop it, folks. There’s no excuse.
Charles W. Moore is a Nova Scotian freelance writer and editor.
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