Car Crash ER Visits Fell In States That Ban Texting While Driving, Study Says (cnn.com) 97
A new study finds that states with bans on texting while driving saw an average 4% reduction in emergency department visits after motor vehicle crashes, an equivalent of 1,632 traffic-related emergency department visits per year. CNN reports: Researchers examined emergency department data across 16 US states between 2007 and 2014. The states were picked based on the availability of information regarding motor vehicle accident injuries for which emergency department treatment was needed. In the United States, 47 out of 50 states currently have laws restricting texting while driving. Of the 16 states researchers looked at in the study, all but one (Arizona) had one of these laws.
The states that had texting bans, regardless of the type or who it applied to, saw a 4% average reduction in emergency department visits, according to the results published Thursday in the American Journal of Public Health. The states that chose to implement primary bans on all drivers saw an 8% reduction in crash-related injuries. Drivers of all ages, even those older 65, who are typically not known for texting while driving, saw reductions in the number of injuries following crashes.
The states that had texting bans, regardless of the type or who it applied to, saw a 4% average reduction in emergency department visits, according to the results published Thursday in the American Journal of Public Health. The states that chose to implement primary bans on all drivers saw an 8% reduction in crash-related injuries. Drivers of all ages, even those older 65, who are typically not known for texting while driving, saw reductions in the number of injuries following crashes.
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Enjoying your schizophasia?
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hymenless primates
Found my new band name!
Penchant for the obvious, much (Score:5, Insightful)
It's interesting that a study like this is even necessary. Who wants the privilege of handling the opposition argument? People will do it anyway? Sure, some will disregard the law out of hand, but a certain percentage will not.
The main problem with the legislation is enforcing texting while driving. Considering the time restraints alone, LEOs can't pull over everyone with a cellphone in their hands; and even if they could, we're mostly not willing to cede our rights away to away to allow a search of our phone for confirmation.
Banning the use of cellular phones entirely, while driving, is the only practical legislation.
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The real use of the law is to add additional charges after a crash to a driver who may have already committed suicide.
That such a law actually improves things for drivers over 65 is no surprise to me; you can get injured by somebody else committing a crime as easily as you can kill yourself by committing one.
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The real use of the law is to add additional charges after a crash to a driver who may have already committed suicide.
Yes. There is enhancement legislation pending in Florida and Texas to have you buried in a suit you hate(d), if you are posthumously found to have been dying to text.
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Best "Onion headline" ever! :D
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Mod parent up and read his newsweek link...priceless!
Re:Penchant for the obvious, much (Score:5, Insightful)
If your only argument is "people will do it anyway", there's pretty much no point in having laws.
The thing that's never mentioned - some people will do it anyway... but less people will do it in general.
I'm amazed that any first-world country still thinks that allowing people to use phones while driving is in any way "safe", no matter the technology in use.
The downhill moment to me is when cars started coming with bluetooth hands-free by default.
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Well mobile phones started as "car phones" because they were too heavy to practically carry around.
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Exactly, The first "car phones" were installed in the back seat.
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If your only argument is "people will do it anyway", there's pretty much no point in having laws.
Many people will "do it anyway", and I occasionally do so myself if the road is straight and empty. But I do it much less, and when I return a missed call and say "Sorry, I couldn't take your call because I was driving", even my boss accepts that answer, because it is the law.
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This is a very good reason-- societal acceptance of missing a call due to being on the road.
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Societal acceptance of missing a call because I didn't want to pick up the fucking phone should also be okay.
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I'm amazed that any first-world country still thinks that allowing people to use phones while driving is in any way "safe"
To be fair, it's a rather cautious approach, when it comes to dealing with the population problem.
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The downhill moment to me is when cars started coming with bluetooth hands-free by default.
The downhill moment is when more automatics were sold than stick shift. People no longer have to know how to drive a car. All they do is press a pedal and shitty software does the rest.
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See how ridiculous that sounds?
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> The downhill moment is when more automatics were sold than stick shift.
Tooling around on an open urban road, a "4-on-the-floor" walked all over a "3-speed-slushbox" 20 years ago. And got much better fuel economy in the process. Nowadays, not so much. An 8-speed double-clutching automatic will beat anybody except a pro driver with a 6-speed manual. Automation advances. Computers can beat the best chess and go players, and they can match professional drivers.
And in real life, stop-and-go crawling in rush
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For every day use the manual will win, especially in fuel mileage, which is the whole point. No matter what automatic you drive, you still have to wait for the "spin up" until it gets whatever gear it thinks it needs to be in. Not to mention except for starting and cruising, an automatic is rarely in the correct geat.
Also, driving a stick shift makes people safer drivers. [nytimes.com]
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WTF are you driving? I haven't waited for an auto to "spin up" since driving my mother's '77 Caddy. Yes, I agree that it makes people safer because they have to use both hands and pay attention. But, I'll never own another stick that I use to drive in rush hour...nearly had to ice my leg down when stuck in a 3 hour jam several years ago.
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That may have been true in the 70s and 80s, and carried a bit into the 90s, but a funny thing happened. Automatics became much more effici
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You have to look at the bigger picture.
1) Is 4% even statistically significant? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe it is just a fluke and accident numbers will level out over the next couple of years.
2) Was there any unintended consequences? This increased demands on law enforcement to police texting. Possible unintended consequences could include.
a) An uptick in other crime related ER visits. Maybe other crimes increased over the same time due to more police spending time ticketing te
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Is 4% even statistically significant?
According to NHTSA 37,461 people died in car crashes in the U.S. in 2016. 4% of that is 1498, so you tell us if that many would be "statistically significant".
"opposition argument"? (Score:2)
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No, they can't, however, if they dedicated just one officer to drive around in an unmarked car and starts nailing people, the area will get the reputation of having such and offenders will either avoid driving in that area or not use their phone when in that area. Just like aggressive speeding enforcement. When offenses drop below a certain point, you can lighten up. If they don't, then you have a good source of revenue to pay for that officer c
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It's not obvious, actually, and it's frankly dangerous to assume it is.
Other studies have demonstrated a clear increase in fatalities when these laws are introduced.
Rather than texting at the top of the steering wheel where they can see the road (granted, on a separate focal plane) they are texting from their laps, looking up and down, so the cops don't see them (in primary states).
I didn't read this study but the decline in injuries among the elderly suggests they may have undiscovered hidden variables. S
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Great analysis.
I didn't read this study but the decline in injuries among the elderly suggests they may have undiscovered hidden variables.
Bell's theorem aside, It seems likely the 65 & older drivers probably do text at some percentage of total drivers, and are arguably more likely to comply when the activity is deemed unlawful.
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Parent: I don't like the results so I'm gonna make strawman arguments against the scientific study.
I'm guessing you don't like the results of the Mueller report too.
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Are you arguing that this shouldn't be illegal? Police should have the option of ticketing someone for doing this, and I just saw a perfect example on Friday while driving home where I observed some moron swerving between three lanes while texting. Sure, he could have been pulled over for other offenses such as not maintaining his lane, or reckless driving, but I'm perfectly fine with adding another layer on top of that. I only wish we'd allow the cop to take his phone and smash it in front of him.
Re:Dumb phone nation (Score:4, Informative)
Phones at fuel pumps isn't anywhere near as dangerous as they make out.
Sure, it's "distracted pumping" but the phone isn't going to ignite the fumes.
The only recorded instances are where someone has literally damaged the battery so bad that it was a fire hazard on its own anyway, a not-very-common occurrence.
The greatest cause of station fires, except for arson, etc., is static discharge. People getting back into their cars repeatedly, never touching the body work, etc. until they go to put their hand near the thing pumping fumes.
Re:Freedumb (Score:5, Insightful)
If a car crash only injured the occupants of the car that caused it you'd have a point...
But a car crash can injure pedestrians, bus riders or occupants of other cars who have done nothing stupid themselves.
Intersections (Score:5, Insightful)
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Careful with statistics (Score:5, Interesting)
You have to be careful about these kinds of statistics. There are such a tremendous amount of uncontrolled variables that chalking this up to one single factor is probably not accurate. Fatalities per mile driven has been on a downward trend since the 1980s.
Also, the fundamental statistic here - the number of emergency room visits following an accident has decreased - does not seem appropriate for this study. Essentially this says that the rate of accidents themselves may be the same (or even have increased), it's just that the likelihood of serious injury has decreased. I'm not sure if they are implying that the accidents were going to happen regardless, and texting simply made them worse? Specifically, the quote about those 65 and older, who are the least likely to text while driving, also showed "reductions in the number of injuries following crashes". Again, it does not say they were in less crashes. It says that the crashes appeared to be less severe and thus they didn't go to the ER as often. That totally sounds like the result of better engineering so crashes result in less severe injuries.
To me, this statistic would indicate an increase in safety due to automobile engineering, or that other changes that directly impact the severity of an accident (reduced speed limits) have also taken affect.
I'm not condoning texting while driving. I just don't like to see data potentially misrepresented even if it is for the "greater good", and thus no harm / no foul if the study is inaccurate.
Pick your statistic (Score:2)
If you look at enough statistics then you will find one that correlates with your hypothesis, if only by chance.
But any proper analysis is far to sophisticated for the political system. And people use phones for navigation. They also text while stopped at traffic lights, illegal in Australia but hardly a concern.
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They also text while stopped at traffic lights, illegal in Australia but hardly a concern.
Sorry, that's also unacceptable. I see it nearly every other day where people are sitting at a green light texting.
Apparently it's a hard habit to break (Score:4, Interesting)
We have laws against distracted driving and some fairly harsh fines. Some people still can't seem to break the habit of texting while driving. A local driver got stopped and ticketed twice in 6 minutes by two different cops and dinged with a total of $1800 in fines and license penalties.
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And destruction of his phone.
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And if your doing so in an area where it's illegal you'll also be paying enough attention to your surroundings to notice if any cops are nearby so you'll never get caught...
The problem is that many people don't pay attention, so they ruin it for everyone else. Many people are bad drivers even when not texting...
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If you can pay that much attention (clue: you can't), then you're also not swerving, sitting at green lights, or driving 10mph below the limit, and thus not the problem.
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Actually, it appears that you're every bit as much of a dumbfuck as most of the population, and probably even more of a dumbfuck.
If you don't look down, why do you need to look up every 2 seconds? At 30 mph, your car traverses almost 90 feet in 2 seconds, but you seem to think it's fine to go that far with your attention on texting.
I think I've seen you out there on the freeway. You're the idiot going 50 mph in the fast lane with a mile of open highway in front of you.
This works with all l;aws (Score:1)
Murder, rape, assault, lying to Contgress, etc. When something is illegal, people stop doing it.
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Damn, you're right! We should just repeal all criminal laws and empty the prisons. I'd mod you Insightful if I hadn't already posted on this thread.
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I'm a dumbfuck who wants to text, and this law shouldn't apply to me. Whatabout murder, rape, assault, lying to "Contgress", etc.
FTFY
behind (Score:2)
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Hater...most states have also banned it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texting_while_driving#Existing_laws) because we leave our driving laws to the states. And in spite of your claim, most countries have not, while a significant number have.
Nope, not buying it (Score:2)
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With that SAME logic, banning (insert "harmful" practice or item) would reduce injury or death. Murder is illegal,
I dont really follow? Are you suggesting killing people shouldn't be illegal because some people do it even though it is illegal? Do you think the number of people murdered would be reduced if murder was legal?
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No, he doesn't want to admit that he's part of the problem, and doesn't like it being called out.
Bad study (maybe), and verybad internet journalism (Score:2)
Texting and driving is bad. Reducing it should make roadways safer. Legislation and enforcement against it could or should be modeled on DUI / DWI prototypes. Etc. We all know that. Trying to verify that suitable legislation and enforcement has the intended and beneficial effects is also important because it guides and improves public policy and funding to address these issues. So, kudos to those who try to conduct worthwhile research or analyze relevant statistics.
Sadly, this paper doesn't really see
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> The science reporting in these articles is always awful. It assumes that the readers of such blogs are all retards, idiots, and profoundly uneducated, providing not one shred of meaningful scientific discussion and insight or even adequate reporting of technical facts from the primary source being reported on - you know, mentioning the actual science.
That is probably a fair assumption. And years of dumbing down has not improved the nation's intellect.
But there is another effect. News is created by jo
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For your readability pleasure... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]