The Curious Autodidact

The FocusDriven board is comprised of family members who lost loved ones due to motorists using their cell phones while driving.

Washington is joining California and several other states in outlawing hand held cell phone use and texting while driving beginning in June. This website FOCUS DRIVEN points out that drivers who use cell phones are four times more likely to be involved in a crash. Additionally it states that, “no difference exists in the cognitive distraction (the mental process of knowing, which includes awareness, judgment and perception) between hand held and hands-free devices, according to simulator studies conducted at the Univ. of Utah.”

Many recent media outlet have covered the recent research findings that a person driving while talking on a cell phone is as potentially dangerous as a person with a .08 blood alcohol level!

A Carnegie Mellon study took pictures of the brain while drivers listened to sentences and drove on a simulator. The drivers listening to sentences had a 37 percent reduction in spatial awareness, which can directly contribute to cognitive distraction.

Here’s a clever diagram that may help your offspring or your friends to keep cell phone etiquette in perspective. I enjoyed the comment beneath the suggest to keep your voice down that suggested if someone is talking loudly on the cell phone in a public place to respond loudly as if they are taking to you (then again they may not notice since these tend to be fairly self-involved people).