Texting while driving

Texting while driving, also called texting and driving, is the act of composing, sending, reading text messages, email, or making similar use of the web on a mobile phone while operating a motor vehicle. Texting while driving is considered extremely dangerous by many people, including authorities, and in some places have either been outlawed or restricted. A survey of more than 90 teens from more than 26 high schools throughout the United States conducted by Liberty Mutual Insurance Group in 2006 showed that 46% of students consider texting to be either "very" or "extremely" distracting. An American Automobile Association study showed that 34% of teens (age 16–17) admitted to being distracted behind the wheel because of texting and 40% of American teens say they have been in a car when the driver used a cell phone in a way that put people in danger. A study involving commercial vehicle operators conducted in September 2009 concluded that though incidence of texting within their dataset was low, texting while driving increased the risk of accident significantly.

Texting has become a social norm since the early 2000s because of the popularity of smartphones. There have been many studies that have linked texting while driving to be the cause of life-threatening accidents due to driver distraction. The International Telecommunication Union states that "texting, making calls, and other interaction with in-vehicle information and communication systems while driving is a serious source of driver distraction and increases the risk of traffic accidents". There are about 1.6 million crashes in the US every year involving cell phone use, of which 500,000 cause injuries and 6,000 cause fatalities. Texting while driving is now the top cause of death among teenagers—texting and driving accounts for 11 teen deaths every day in the US. Overall, texting is involved in about 25% of all car accidents in the US.

A 2010 experiment with Car and Driver magazine editor Eddie Alterman, which took place at a deserted air strip, showed that texting while driving had a worse impact on safety than driving while intoxicated. While legally drunk, Alterman's stopping distance from 70 mph (110 km/h) increased by 4 feet (1.2 m); by contrast, reading an e-mail added 36 feet (11 m), and sending a text added 70 feet (21 m). While celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey have campaigned against texting while driving, there are reports that the message has not been getting through to teenagers.

...
Wikipedia