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Gamers Better at Driving w/ Cell Phones?
sl4shd0rk writes "A lot of people think talking on the cell phone while driving is natural, but each time someone asks a question or changes the subject, it's like taking on a new task, Psychologists who study multi-tasking have argued for years about whether these "information bottlenecks" occur because people are inherently lazy, or because they have a fundamental inability to switch from one task to another. Mei-Ching Lien, an assistant professor of psychology at Oregon State University. "Even with a seemingly simple task, structural cognitive limitations can prevent you from efficiently switching to a new task."
I have to say that the best ones are those who play a lot of video games," she pointed out. "Those are lab studies, however, and not driving tests." " All I know is that I could get where I was going better if I could shoot turtles at others on the highway.
Heavily practicing tasks allows one to perform them better and with more consistency than people who have never tried!
Has it yet been considered that humans aren't necessarily BAD at multitasking, but we're plenty of capable of training ourselves to be better at it? You know, much like we are with almost everything else that is a learned behavior.
Perhaps all driver license tests should include a multitasking reaction time test. The person would have to listen to and correctly answer questions about driving (i.e., a voice response version of the written part of the driver's test) while taking a simulated driving test that checks reaction time and the ability to multitask. You would have to both drive safely AND verbally answer the questions correctly. Those who pass both halves of the test get a license to use a cellphone whilst driving and those that don't don't. Retaking this test every 10 years would help deal with any age-related cognitive declines.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Correct, but why should we be required to physically drive? GPS technology can offer centimeter accuracy, detailed electronic maps of cities already exist, algorithms that choose the optimal path in a graph are known for half a century, sonic radars (or other type) can already be used for regulating the flow of indepentent vehicles on a road.
I'd rather spend my time working and talking, even if in a car on road to work, rather than having to actually pay attention to the road.
Billions of dollars are spent to things like the Iraq war, instead of improving our lives.
"There's a "zone" they get into, where distractions just don't get through - telephone,"
That right there may be a part of it.
Does this mean that I, as a pedestrian or bicyclist, will now be required to carry a GPS device so that some idiot who's letting his car drive doesn't run me down?
Be a real patriot: Question authority. Think for yourself. Formulate your own conclusions.
"You can't control a car with one hand (unless specially adapted), let alone control it with one hand while you focus on going "oh really? Yes? wow? cool!" over and over down a phone."
Really? What's so difficult about it? You can talk to a passenger in your car while driving can't you? Talking to a passenger is in most cases even more distracting because you're so used to looking at people when you talk that it may cause you to take your eyes off the road (especially if they say something like "it looked like this *hand motion*". As for driving with one hand, anyone who drives a stick shift car has to do this for at least part of their driving and personally I never really had a problem with it. Growing up driving a manual, I still drive my automatic today with one hand most of the time. It's not that difficult once you get used to it.
The real problem here is just bad drivers. There are people who don't pay enough attention to their driving. They focus on the cell phone, referee kids in the back seat, etc, etc instead of focusing on the road. THIS is the real problem. I suppose what this article is saying is that gamers tend to be able to focus on multiple tasks at once and therefore are less likely to focus too intensely on the cell phone or the kids (gamers wouldn't have these btw) or what have you.
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I think I agree. I consider myself a "gamer", I am a little older then average but I've had every game console since pong in the mid 70's. Through gaming, I have developed great hand eye coordination, a decent ability to look for and predict how other people may react in certain situations, and I am expecting the unexpected. Those skills are great to have as a driver but I still suck at driving while on the cell phone, hands free or not. Maybe gamers are statistically better at driving overall beacause of these skills but they would still suffer from the multitasking part of talking and driving. I set a negative nice level to the phone conversation which leaves what ever mind scheduling is left over for driving. For me? It depends on the conversation. If I am discussing "how did your day go", I think I can still drive pretty decent, if I am trying to explain a recent change to our firewall to my boss, I think I'd be a road hazard.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
It is possible to talk on the phone and drive. The trick is simple: you must make concentrating on the road your priority. What I mean is this: you must actively THINK that you are driving. Talking on the cell becomes of much lesser priority. If something interrupts your normal driving pattern just drop the phone instantly, just put 100% of all your capacities to the road. For example if someone cuts you off too damn close, you must act as if there is no cell phone in your hand. I admit, sometimes I drive that way. Of-course I prefer not to be on the phone while driving, but you can't do much about it. We spend too much time driving, there is no surprise that people talk on the phone, this is inevitable.
Unfortunately almost all people don't do it that way. For some strange reason they concentrate on the phone call and view their driving as the secondary task. This leads to accidents. Probably everyone who drives (myself included,) have witnessed someone doing something incredibly stupid while on the phone.
I actually think talking on the phone while driving should become part of the driving test. We can't stop people from talking on the phone. Really. They will use hands-free devices and no police will be able to enforce a law like that. So we must TEACH people to do it right. Part of the course and exam must include a person calling the driver, while the teacher/examiner observe the driver's behaviour. The driver must learn to pay 95% of his attention to the road, to observe the traffic laws AND follow them and to drive in real traffic conditions without endangering the rest of the world by their behaviour. They should be taught to drop the phone conversation instantly, I mean in a hundred of a millisecond and completely concentrate on the road if they feel that a dangerous situation is coming up. But this will probably prohibit many people from driving at all, but you know what? Then you should have an extra configuration in your driver's license: Did not pass drive while talking exam. The penalties for driving and talking and causing an accident should be extra-severe for these people.
I had an accident about 4 years ago (and no, I wasn't on the phone,) a fender-bender. Also I spun out of control once (I behaved stupidely, made a very sharp turn at a very high velocity) didn't hit anything but after a 270 turn both rear wheels went into a ditch. After these 2 incidents I have developed some kind of a reflex, when I stop paying attention to the road for even a millisecond, a scene plays in my mind: I FEEL like I am crashing into something HARD. I feel it with every cell in my body and it forces me to start paying fullest attention again. I am telling you, this feeling prevented me from doing quite a few stupid things and probably from a few accidents (I almost never go with the speed limit though, I always go at least 25% faster.) But you can't develop this reflex from instructions, unfortunately you have to go through bad things a couple of times to have it automatically. It's unpleasant to feel this, but if it saves me from an accident I am just glad that I have it.
You can't handle the truth.
In the airlines in the US, the flying duties of the crew are rather strictly divided into the "Flying Pilot" and the "Non-flying Pilot" (FP and NP for short). In essence, the FP is responsible for making sure the airplane is pointed and powered correctly, and the NP is responsible for everything else, INCLUDING RADIO COMMUNICATION. Most airline pilots I have met are quite good at multi-tasking (or they would not be here), but just because you CAN do something, if necessary, doesn't mean you SHOULD. When the consequences of failure involve the wounding/deaths of other people, SOP should be to avoid multi-tasking whenever possible. Unfortunately, people will bitch and moan about the airlines not doing everything in creation to assure their saftey, while driving 30+ in excess of the speed limit while yapping on a phone.
In addition, it has been shown that multi-tasking requires so much focus that extremely vital clues to the bigger picture are missed. There is a classic old film short shown in airline training, where a group of 6 people, 3 dressed in white and 3 dressed in black, are shown, bouncing and tossing two basketballs around. You are told to count the number of times a ball is bounced (not tossed) from one white clothed person to another. The film then starts moving. It is actually a complex task, because not only do you have two balls to watch, you have to carefully note whether it came from and then goes to a white team member. This film goes for about 30 seconds. At the end, every one is asked as to how many ball-bounces between whites they counted. Most of the time, the answers agree within +/-2 out of 10. Occasionally, one person asks, "But what about the gorilla?!?"
You see, the most amazing thing is, that while these 6 people are bouncing balls around, a guy dressed in a gorilla suit walks into the frame, stands in the middle of all the action, WAVES AT THE FRIGGIN' CAMERA, and walks off the other side. ALMOST NOBODY SEES HIM. Everyone is so intent on counting those bouncing balls that they don't see anything else at all. It is hard to belive how you would fall for this, so they replay the film. And there is the gorilla, plain as day. It is meant to show why it is important to carefully divide up responsibilites so that you don't become so focused on task that you miss the waving gorilla... or the approaching mountains, or the depleteing fuel, etc., etc.
Back to cars, if nothing ever went wrong, driving and yapping would not be such a big deal. But a large number of car accidents are based on recognizing a developing situation rapidly, and the biggest thing that goes with multi-tasking is situational awareness. Can you get away with it most of the time? Sure. But 4000 people a month in the US croak in car accidents - more in a year than all the aviation accidents in history combined (plus all terrorist attacks combined as well). So I think people should treat driving as the serious responsibility that it is and STOP YAPPING ON PHONES WHILE DRIVING. If you don't have the maturity level to realize why you should leave a safety margin between the load on and the maximum level of your capabilities when driving a car, you SHOULDN'T BE DRIVING.
While concentration does indeed play a bigger role, you are wrong to to imply that hands free sets cannot make you substantially safer. Consider the driver of a vehicle with manual transmission in relatively dense traffic. Steering and shifting gears requires both hands for doing both at the same time, which is often neccessary. If you're on the phone, you have to put your head into an awkard position which compromises safety. Or, you have to briefly use your steering hand to shift gears while holding the cell in your other hand. Either way, a hands free kit makes drivers who insist on talking on their phone significantly safer, just not AS safe as not being on the phone.
I will admit that this scenario is uncommon compared to normal driving in an automatic, and thus is not reflected in results of studies not specifically looking at it. However, I can testify from experience that a hands free kit makes me alot less likely to crash when talking on the phone when I'm in dense traffic having to frequently shift gears while not moving in a perfectly straight line.
Also, while the person next to you can be looking for hazards, and often does, if you are engaged in a conversation they are frequently looking at you just as you are looking at them, in fact usually moreso since they don't have to watch the road.
Bottom line is the effectiveness of a hands free kit and comparison to other people in the car is entirely dependent on the scenario, and its wrong to take the results of generalized studies and talk like hands free kits are completely useless for increasing safety.
Except that passengers don't focus on the traffic outside very much, and during a conversation not at all. And only one passenger has an opportunity to look forward anyway.
Talking to a phone might be less natural, but it's also engages only your hearing. An actual person sitting next to you will give more stimulus than a distorted voice.
And no, I don't base these opinions on any research at all.
"Attention Deficit" is classified as a disorder by some. Not having it myself, I often think I a have trouble with the modern world - I like to focus on single tasks instead of being distracted and interrupted all the time.
I sense that this is one of those researchers that wants to classify ADD as a functional adaptation to post-modern life, rather than a disorder. Those with an *in*ability to "multitask" (ie, manage distractions) are the ones with the disorder.