Virginia Tech researchers find novice teen drivers easily fall into distraction, accidents

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BLACKSBURG, Va., Jan. 2, 2014 – Teens may begin their driving habits with great caution, but as months behind the wheel pass, they begin to multi-task at higher frequency rates – dialing cell phones, eating, and talking to passengers, etc. – and therefore greatly raise their risk of crashes and/or near-crash incidents.

These findings from a study conducted by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute and the National Institutes of Child Health and Human Development appear in the Jan. 2 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

“Novice drivers are more likely to engage in high-risk secondary tasks more frequently over time as they became more comfortable with driving,” said Charlie Klauer, group leader for teen risk and injury prevention at the transportation institute’s Center for Vulnerable Road User Safety and first author of the article. “The increasingly high rates of secondary task engagement among newly licensed novice drivers in our study are worrisome as this appears to be an important contributing factor to crashes or near-crashes.”

full: http://www.vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2014/01/010214-vtti-nejm.html

The AP just reported on this study. It comes out just as California's new law banning under-18s from ANY cell phone use while driving goes into effect.

[Igel]

1. Just those under 18?

Texting and cell phone use = drunk driving.

It doesn't matter if it's hands-free or not. The error rate's about the same. It's not the mechanics that are the problems, it's the sheer inability of people to truly multitask. You have one focus. It can be on the phone, it can be on traffic. When you shift tasks, you're unloading and reloading memory. This takes time. We're not computers, so we make mistakes. We have to get our bearings--if we're driving, what are the hazards around us, what's our speed, our direction? That takes time.

Somewhere in there you go crash and wonder what it was that hit you, only to find out that you hit something else.

People think they multitask. That's because evaluating your performance is yet another task and if you're already alternating your focus between two tasks and screwing those up, what's the likelihood you'll be able to add a third task and do a good job with that that one to even spot that you're screwing up?

Observers, on the other hand, with nice videocameras and observation sheets have just one focus. Watching those who are doing such a good job multitasking screw up without realizing it or remembering it.