Driving is a complex operation: distractions for the driver can prove deadly.
This month, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (“NHTSA”) published its latest research findings regarding fatal traffic accidents in this country in tandem with the kickoff of its annual program to bring greater public awareness of distracted driving dangers. Read, “NHTSA Launches Put the Phone Away or Pay Campaign; Releases 2023 Fatality Early Estimates,” published by NHTSA on April 1, 2024.
April is Distracted Driving Awareness Month
Each April, NHTSA along with safety agencies like Illinois’ internationally renowned National Safety Council (NSC) as well as advocates for accident victims and their loved ones participate and promote a month-long public awareness effort to try and combat the known risks of drivers operating motor vehicles while their brains are distracted by various things. See, “NSC Observes Distracted Driving Awareness Month,” published by the NSC on April 3, 2024.
Put the Phone Away or Pay: 2024 Campaign
This year, NHTSA is targeting the reduction of distracted driving fatalities with its “Put the Phone Away or Pay” campaign. This entails educating the general public and especially drivers not only of (1) the very real danger of a fatal accident caused by distractions but (2) in many states there are criminal statutes in place to try and stop these kinds of preventable accidents.
In both Illinois and Indiana, for instance, it is illegal for drivers to use handheld cellphones as well as for drivers to text while behind the wheel.
From NHTSA Deputy Administrator Sophie Shulman:
“Distracted driving is extremely dangerous. Distraction comes in many forms, but it is also preventable. Our rebranded campaign reminds everyone to Put the Phone Away or Pay, because distracted driving can cost you in fines – or even cost your life or the life of someone else on the road.”
Distracted Drivers and Deadly Accidents: Sobering Statistics
The latest findings from NHTSA include a tally that in 2022, 3,308 people were killed and an estimated additional 289,310 people were injured in crashes involving distracted drivers. Among these deaths: 621 accident victims who were “outside the vehicle” as pedestrians, bicyclists, etc.
NHTSA warns us that approximately nine (9) people die each day in this country from injuries sustained in distracted driving accidents.
For more, read Distracted Driving in 2020: New Findings Warn of Continued Risk of Deadly Accidents Due to Phone Distractions; and Fatal Distracted Driving Accidents: How Much at Risk are You Here in Indiana and Illinois?
Driving and the Brain: Distractions Are Dangerous
For many people, asking them to avoid their phones while they are driving their car, minivan, SUV, pickup, semi-truck, tractor-trailer, Uber, Lyft, cab, or delivery van seems silly if not outright exasperating or insulting. Competent behind the wheel, with never an accident on their record, many drivers think they are easily able to handle their phones as well as other things like infotainment systems in their dash or GPS apps alerting them to their next turn.
The truth is that drivers are not able to do so — no matter how experienced or capable their driving skills. This is because of how the human brain is built to handle incoming data.
Driving is a complex operation in its own right. Adding these distracting externalities to that task invites brain overload and impedes cognitive function.
Numerous studies into brain activity involved with motor vehicle operations confirms that drivers are best able to safely perform the job of driving when they have their eyes on the road and both hands on the steering wheel. Anything that moves their eyes or their hands away from these positions is considered a distraction to the performance, creating a “high cognitive burden.”
In many instances, the distraction, no matter how minor or minute, invites immediate danger of a fatal accident. How? The brain processes incoming information in certain ways. The distractions will cause things like:
- Missed visual cues
- Slower reaction times
- Tunnel vision
- Expectancy violation.
Studies into Driver Distractions and the Brain
Brain distractions for drivers are divided into three categories: (1) visual, where the eyes are not on the road; (2) manual, where both hands are not on the wheel; and (3) cognitive, where the mind is totally off the task of driving the vehicle.
Studies have been done of drivers that include things like tracking brainwave (EEG) activity and reaction times to things like light or braking. A great many research studies have been done, and are continuing to be done, in attempts to find ways to curtain fatal distraction accidents on our roadways.
The reality that the human brain cannot “multitask” while driving a motor vehicle is clear. Distracted driving fatalities are preventable accidents where cognitive limitations have not been properly understood and appreciated.
As explained by the AAA Foundation, distractions impact the human brain of the driver in many ways that are dangerous:
- Even when a driver’s eyes are on the road and hands are on the wheel, sources of cognitive distraction cause significant impairments to driving, such as:
- Suppressed brain activity in the areas needed for safe driving;
- Increased reaction time (to peripheral detection test and lead vehicle braking);
- Missed cues and decreased accuracy (to peripheral detection test); and
- Decreased visual scanning of the driving environment (tunnel vision, of sorts).
- Driver interactions with in-vehicle speech-to-text systems (such as the infotainment offerings in many new vehicles) create the highest level of cognitive distraction among the tasks assessed.
For more, read Strayer, D.L., Cooper, J.M., Turrill, J., Coleman, J.R., Medeiros-Ward, N. & Biondi, F. (2013). Measuring Cognitive Distraction in the Automobile (Technical Report). Washington, D.C.: AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety. Also see: Yuen, Nicole H., et al. “Driving with distraction: measuring brain activity and oculomotor behavior using fMRI and eye-tracking.” Frontiers in human neuroscience 15 (2021): 659040 and Strayer, David L., and Donald L. Fisher. “SPIDER: A framework for understanding driver distraction.” Human factors 58.1 (2016): 5-12.
Driver Distractions and Fatal Motor Vehicle Accidents in Indiana or Illinois
After a catastrophic motor vehicle accident, there will be a number of investigations into why the crash happened. Of course, there will be police investigators compiling their reports as well as possible coroner determinations with information fresh from the accident scene. Sometimes, there will be investigations by other authorities or agencies with a government interest in the event (e.g., the Federal Railroad Administration after a railroad crossing fatality).
Insurance carriers will have their own investigations done. Defense attorneys for any party that might be liable for what transpired may also have investigators checking into the accident. And the accident victim has an independent right to investigate a motor vehicle accident to find out all the reasons why the crash took place.
Some of these investigations may be more in depth than others, and some may weigh some factors more heavily than others. Experts in accident reconstruction including driver distraction may be needed here.
One or more of these investigations into a fatal crash may reveal all sorts of shocking, everyday things that contributed to a driver’s brain being distracted at the time of impact. These include one of more of the following:
- Brushing hair
- Checking the GPS app
- Checking social media on the phone
- Daydreaming
- Drinking coffee or soft drinks while driving
- Eating food while driving
- Getting something out of purse or briefcase
- Handling pets in the car
- Parenting kids in the car
- Putting on makeup
- Selecting or changing the music
- Smoking or vaping
- Talking on the phone (regardless of the law against it)
- Texting (regardless of the law against it).
Delve into the above-referenced studies, and these types of activities within the human brain effectively cause the frontal cortex to divide its activities into two areas: the driving and the distractions.
Notice how some drivers may be doing more than one of the things on this list at the same time they are driving a motor vehicle at significant speeds on our roadways.
Fatal distracted driving accidents can happen in an instant. All too often, for instance, pedestrian fatalities are met with the outcry “but I never saw them!” only to find out the driver was doing things that distracted them from a full focus on driving itself. Their distracted brain may not have been able to fully comprehend that pedestrian in their path until it was too late.
For more, read: Why is Chicago So Deadly for Pedestrians? and Driving, the Brain, and Serious or Fatal Injuries: The Neuroscience of Driving in Car Accidents and Truck Crashes.
Distracted driving is much more common than most of us realize. Many drivers are not aware how easily their cognitive function can be impaired with very simple things (like drinking coffee or scolding the kids in the backseat). Fatal distracted driving accidents are true tragedies, and no one walks away unharmed. Even those that survive these crashes can suffer lifelong psychological trauma as well as other harm. Please be careful out there!
