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Effects of using a cell phone while driving essay
The dangers of cellphone use while driving outline
The dangers of using cellphones while driving
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Use of Cellular Phones While Driving
Cellular phone is a wireless and hand-held device that is well known to the public. It is very common to have a cellular phone now a day since cell phone was introduced to the United States in 1983. According to the wireless industryfs trade association, Cellular Communications & Internet Association, there are over 135 million subscribers in the United States at the time of this writing. It estimates that there will be over 200 million cellular phone subscribers in world wide by the year of 2005.
The use of cellular phone has skyrocketed since low-price phones and services plans became widely available to the general public in the recent years. As cellular phone is getting more and more popular among us, the way of how people communicate has been changed quite a bit. This increase of cell phone users has been accompanied by an increase in the number of people talking on the phone concurrently with driving. For instance, according to David Strayer and William Johnston, recent surveys indicate that 85% of cell phone owners use their phone at least occasionally while driving, and 27% report using their phones on half of their trips.
Is it dangerous to talk on a cellular phone when someone is driving? This issue is still being debated all over the world. We all have seen people talking on their cell phone and driving at the same time. Can they really do that talking in the phone and being concentrated on driving? Can a phone conversation be dangerous while driving? There are some governments looking at this safety problem and some of governments even have set some restrictions to use cell phone as driving. According to Tenisha Mercer,
Brooklyn Heights, Ohio, was the fi...
... middle of paper ...
... his/her hands widely, s/he is not drunk but talking on a cell phone.
l You never take your eyes off the road to dial or answer your cellular phone
when driving.
l Donft talk on your cellular phone when you are on the road unless there is
an emergency occurred. Turn off your phone when you are in your car if it is
possible.
References:
David L. Strayer and William A. Johnston (2001). Driven to Distraction: Dual-Task Studies of Simulated Driving and Conversing on a Cellular Telephone Psychological Science, Nov2001, Vol. 12 Issue 6, p462
http://www.womanmotorist.com/ftrs/tm-cell-phones-and-driving-2k1-01.shtml 2/19/2003
http://www.mrtraffic.com/cellular.htm 2/19/2003
http://www.wave-guide.org/archives/emf-l/Jul2000/Use-of-cellular-phone-while-driving--
a-columnist--eats-crow--.html
Over the past two decades the use of cell phones has grown significantly and statistic from the past two years have proven that driving while on the phone or texting is becoming one of the leading causes of traffic accidents today. In 2011, a survey of more than 2800 American adults revealed that even thought they know that using a cell phone or texting while driving is distracting, they do it anyway, and teens surveyed admit that texting while driving is their number one distraction. "Each year, 21% of fatal car crashes involving teenagers between the ages of 16 and 19 were the result of cell phone usage. This result has been expected to grow as much as 4% ...
Another negative effect that mobile phones impair is mental focus while driving. People who are driving have their minds on the task in front of them with their full attention on the road. So when a person is conversing on a phone their attention is split as he or she is trying to multi-task both talking and driving at the same time. An article written by Nathan Seppa, the cause of “split attention”, he noted that David Strayer a psychology professor and his team studied to understand what impairs drivers when they talk on the phone. They conducted an experiment with drivers to see the effects of how varies distractions compare to each other. Strayer’s team accompanied drivers and assign them different distractive tasks while they maintain their eyes on the road in order to assess the effects. In the team’s findings they found that one most distracting tasks was talking on a mobile phone, which caused a driver’s performance to decline significantly. The typical tasks that drivers should perform on a regular basis, such as observing traffic changes, looking in rear-view mirrors, and watching for pedestrians was reduced overall (Seppa). Not many people can multi-task a conversation and driving at the same time without some drawbacks. Another drawback to a person focus was “unintentional blindness”, described by Simons, as “looking at something and not seeing it” (Seppa). So a person who is talking on a phone can end up not seeing an object whether it is a car, a stop sign or a pedestrian that is right in front of him and her. Many experiments were conducted by professionals to understand how “unintentional blindness” can affect a person’s perception, but one notable professional, Simmons, conducted a test of this concept:
First of all, there are times when a person is driving and an important matter may require their attention. However, that does not constitute the use of a cell phone while driving. It is much safer and easier to just pull the vehicle to the side of the roadway or a nearby parking lot and then answer
The several effects of distracted driving are deadly. Andrew Lavallee points out that “texting while driving is unsafe. Not only are a driver’s eyes off the road, one or both hands are off the wheel.” “We think it is incompatible with safe driving” (qtd. in Lavallee). “Study upon study showed that talking on a cellphone was far more dangerous than she’d realized – that a driver on a phone had the same reaction speed as someone legally intoxicated, that those talking on a phone behind the wheel are four times as likely to crash” (qtd. in Hanes). Stephanie Hanes also mentions that, “Unlike a conversation with a passenger, the electronic conversation takes a driver into a virtual space away from the road.” Subsequently, this causes severe problems and deadly
The act of driving itself already demands a great amount of focus and concentration from the driver. Adding a cell phone to the picture introduces additional challenges for the brain. Researchers at Monash University's Accident Research Centre have shown that multi-tasking between driving and text messaging increases the mental workload causing higher levels of stress and frustration . For instance, stress is heightened when shifting from driving on a local route to entering a highway or vice versa. Using a phone (checking a text message, posting a Facebook status) contributes to increasing the complexity of the task at hand. This exhausts the brain, weakens the operator’s driving abilities, and compromises th...
...ivers to protect are self from oblivious and preventable actions. We can do this by turning are phones off or stopping the use of handheld devices and use speaker phone or just wait till we arrive at are destination. Driving requires full concentration and having a cell phone and texting causes detraction when you are supposed to be alert.
Several individuals need to be constantly sending messages to their friends and family members with the use of a cellphone while driving. More and more drivers have the urge to use their cell phones while driving. This dangerous mixture can result to be even deadly. “As one researcher concluded, a cellphone draws attention away from the routines that would provide a good representation of the driving environment” (qtd. in Seppa 3).
This paper examines the dangers that arise when cell phones are used at the same time as operating a vehicle. The paper will explore the following question of why this is a problem and why the research is important. The variables investigated are the use of cell phones while driving, whether speaking or texting, and the accidents and fatalities caused from the distraction. Data of the accidents and fatalities caused by drivers distracted by their cells phones is stated to research and further explores the age group and gender of the people involved into the accidents to uncover patterns. Possible outcomes of the implementation of laws prohibiting cell phone use while driving are discussed as well as the sampling measures used to survey and research the variables.
A. People are constantly fixated on their phones, checking Twitter, Facebook, and text messages. The use of a cell phones while driving is extremely distracting and dangerous to the person behind the wheel, and everyone else on the road as well.
One of the dangers of texting while driving at the same time is the attention it takes away from the road. A driver, who is focused on looking at their phone, is not paying enough attention to other cars or what is happening around them. Something as simple as a car stopping in front of them can cause serious damage to the driver and to the other car. “Texting” while driving is the act of composing, sending, or reading text messages, email, or making other similar use of the internet on a mobile device while operating a motor vehicle, such as an automobile, truck, or train (Reuters). Many people and authorities have viewed it as a dangerous practice. It is on occasion like this, where familiarity with the road and surrounding will not make it easier for the driver to look at their cell phone. The probabilities of drivers texting on the cell phone and getting into accidents are only getting higher. Cell phone use while driving accounts for a major cause of
The cell phone however, while convenient, will often lead to many hazardous accidents and sometimes deaths. While most will admit using a cell phone while driving is dangerous, many still do it. Distracted driving as a whole should been seen as a violent act of selfishness closely related to murderous intent. The use of a cell phone behind the wheel is just like being drunk behind the wheel so it is easy to imagine thousands of people driving throughout the day “drunk”. David L. Strayer, Professor at the University of Utah in Cognition and Neural Science, reveals in his research “A Comparison of the Cell Phone Driver and the Drunk Driver” that “people who drive while talking on their cell phones are as impaired as drunk drivers with a blood alcohol level of 0.08 %”(Strayer). With this in mind it is no wonder Distracted driving is a common factor in collisions. This can be understood in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s article, “NHTSA Policy and FAQs on Cellular Phone Use While Driving”. In the article, the NHTSA concedes that “driving distractions, including the use of cell phones, contribute to 25% of all traffic crashes” (NHTSA.gov). The reader should keep in mind that distracted driving is closely related to cell phone
I, as a driver, too, think that cell phone use while driving is a distraction. Even though I personally don’t own a phone, I have used one. I noticed that talking on the cellular phone and driving doesn’t make it hard to focus on the road. But it is difficult and a major distraction to dial-up a number without losing focus on the road. Dialing a number is the main distraction about cel...
It is a huge responsibility to drive a car and one which should not be taken for granted because it is associated with the lives of others. By speaking on cell phones while driving, such a responsibility is treated with impunity and the dangers ignored.
Over the last few decades, the use of cell phones has become a very common tool. Furthermore, Technology has certainly advanced, and the cell phone is becoming the most preferred mode of communication. The demand for a cell phone is growing every day. In addition, the use of wireless technology is affordable, and anyone can buy a cell phone at a reasonable price. They come in all shapes and sizes. They range from black to bright metallic white. American public use of cell phones is increasing everyday. As the number of people using cell phones increase, the use of cell phones while driving will also increase on our streets and highways. At the same rate, motorists still converse on cell phones and write text messages while driving. Motorist will also engage in other activities apart from driving. For example, drivers will text when driving, and they will dial numbers. Drivers will receive calls and converse with the recipient for long periods. Again, driving demands your full attention, and your concentration needed when talking on the phone. However, it means that the driver has to divert his attention to the conversation, which leads to less concentration on the road. On the contrary, one can therefore connect motorist’s accidents and cell phone usage while driving.
Strayer, D. L. & Johnston, W. A. (2001) Driven to distraction: Dual task studies of simulated driving and conversing on a cellular phone. Psychological Science, 12, 462-466