Research says crossing the road with a mobile is dangerous for children

Children who are talking on their mobile phone when crossing the road are at greater risk of being involved in an accident, according to research from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA. Pretty obvious when you think about it. Psychologists who used a virtual reality software program found that all of the children tested (aged 10-11) were more likely to exhibit risky behaviour when they crossed the street while talking on a mobile phone, even when the children were familiar with mobiles or were rated as highly attentive. Children using mobiles took an average 20% longer to cross the road, gave themselves 8% less time to cross safely in front of traffic and were 43% more likely to be hit by a vehicle or to have a close call. [Press release]

The Key to Safe Driving?

Sounding rather similar to the Aegis Mobility service, Key2SafeDriving is a wireless device designed by the University of Utah that does its best to stop young people from driving while using their mobile phone. The Key2SafeDriving (k2sd) device holds the ignition key and puts the driver's phone into 'Driving Mode' when the key is released for use. This causes the phone to display a 'Stop' message and also prevents the phone from ringing when someone calls. [Press release via Media-Newswire.com]

Name-calling for textlemmings

Here's the perfect antidote for our previous story. Professor Peter Norton from the University of Virginia says mobile phone users who walk into traffic while texting need to be given a derogatory name. He says it worked to dissuade jaywalkers - a term that entered the dictionary just ten years after it was devised - and wonders whether ‘textlemmings’ would work. [Source: Cellular-News.com]

Hands-free calls in cars add 5 metres to stopping distance

Here's a story that echoes last week's warning about distracting hands-free conversations. Psychology researchers led by Dr Melina Kunar at the University of Warwick have published a research paper that shows mobile phone conversations impair reaction time by an average of 212 milliseconds, which equates to an extra 5.7 metres braking distance for a car travelling at 60 miles an hour. In addition, drivers using their phones suffer 83% more errors than those driving without the distraction of a mobile phone conversation. Listening to a story made very little difference to the test participants' response times or accuracy. [Press release]

5th anniversary of hands-free law marked by RoSPA

RoSPA, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, is reminding motorists about the risks of making a call or texting at the wheel five years after it became illegal to use a hand-held mobile phone while driving. The law was introduced in Britain on 1st December 2003 but casualty statistics reveal there were 25 fatal accidents, 64 serious accidents and 259 other accidents on Britain’s roads last year in which a driver using a mobile phone was recorded as a contributory factor. They also point to research that shows using a mobile phone at the wheel – whether hand-held or hands-free – makes you four times more likely to have an accident. [Press release]

Hands-free conversations are more distracting than talking to passengers

The December issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, which is published by the American Psychological Association, says drivers make more mistakes when talking on a mobile phone than when talking to passengers. The study looked at 41 mostly young adult drivers paired with 41 friends. The results of the experiment, which was conducted using a driving simulator, showed that mobile phone users were more likely to drift in their lane, kept a greater distance between their car and the car in front, and were four times more likely to miss pulling off the highway at the rest area. Passenger conversation barely affected these three measures. In addition, the passengers took an active role in helping the driver, often talking about surrounding traffic. [Press release; PDF of article]

Hands-free law isn't working, say road safety experts

The Local Authority Road Safety Officers' Association (LARSOA) has carried out a poll on the effectiveness of the UK's "hands-free" legislation. A year ago, the penalty for using a hand-held mobile phone while driving was increased (from £30 and no penalty points) to £60 with three penalty points. All 185 LARSOA members were asked whether they thought the legislation had been effective. Although 100% of members agreed with the legislation, 75% of members didn't think it had been effective. LARSOA is encouraging drivers to switch off their mobile phones when they get in the car and to make use of voicemail. [Press release]