Even before I got into safety, I’ve always been a “Be the change you want to see,” (Indra Gandhi quote)/ lead by example kind of person. I’d absolutely feel like a hypocrite asking people to ‘get home safe’ on the job when I’m doing something proven to be scientifically stupid while driving.
This is why the Ted Talk Distraction is literally killing us | Paul Atchley | TEDxYouth@KC had me cringing. According to multiple driving simulation experiments, I might as well be drunk behind the wheel while talking ‘hands-free’ on my mobile and driving.
Given that 40,000 people die in road accident in the United States every year (that’s the population of Wanganui), and in NZ we lost 380 people due to road accidents in 2017, this is a big deal. Driver distraction has a big part to play in these stats and I don’t want to become one of the numbers.
Who is behind the research?
Paul Atchley is a researcher at Kansas University and he has spent the last 27 years studying cognitive factors relating to driving.
What does the research say?
Atchley has worked with pedestrians, pilots and drivers to help them focus their attention. Based on over 50 years of accumulated research studies, he found we are four times more likely to get into a car crash while we are talking on a mobile phone. Using a phone in any manner (touching it, hands-free…. just talking at it) is about as bad as driving drunk.
In fact, one study conducted in Utah found that drunk drivers were BETTER at driving a simulator because they KNEW they were drunk and were extra cautious. Their response time was slower; however, they crushed the brake pedal extra hard.
Why Do We Crash While Talking and Driving?
Atchley’s TED talk includes some interesting brain scans. They show that your mental capacity is so engaged in the conversation your reactions to stimuli on the road is greatly decreased. Instead of scanning to the horizon, drivers are suddenly focused on the bonnet of their car and their visually focusing brain capacity decreases by 40%.
No amount of training, vehicle safety engineering or improvements to emergency response time will change the driver fatality due to distraction stats, as long as we are engaged with our mobiles.
Why are we addicted to our mobiles?
Chris Bailey an international productivity expert explains why this happens in the How to Be Awesome At Your Job Podcast: Episode 339. As we are motivated by things that are either:
- Pleasurable = our brain produces dopamine
- Threatening= our brain produces adrenaline; or
- Novel = Once we work out if the experience is pleasurable or threatening we then get our dose of either dopamine or adrenaline.
The Smart Phone / Social Media world is a hard-wired business model designed to get us to be active on our phone. Whether it be checking our social media feeds, email or answering calls and texts. As long as we can hear the ‘bleep’ the neurotransmitters in our brain are going to demand a response.
What’s the solution?
I’ve now got into a routine where I put my phone on ‘Airplane Mode’ when I get in my car, and I don’t turn it on again until I’ve parked.
I’ve also turned off all social media and email notifications on my phone. This means although they are still all there to be seen, I only get ‘bleeped’ when a phone call or text comes in.
I do still listen to podcast and music playlists while driving, and Atchley says in-vehicle conversations with a passenger are also not distracting in the same way as our phones are. Anecdotally, I’ve found myself more relaxed when I reach my destination and I’m turning my phone to ‘airplane’ mode any time throughout my day when I need to focus.
This week, your challenge is to see how many members of your team you can get to:
- a)Turn their phone to aeroplane mode while driving
- b)Turn off all social media notifications off on their phone and see what happens.
As always, let me know how your experiments go and if you have any ideas about driver safety to add.
Finally, I’m off the HASANZ Conference in Wellington this week, if you are going to be there please say hi and watch this space. I’m anticipating lots of blog fodder, so there no doubt be some interesting posts coming out over the next few weeks.
Have a safe and productive week,
SB