Text-Messaging Behind the Wheel

theodp writes "TIME interviews 21-year-old Taylor Leming, creator of the 600-member Facebook group I Text Message People While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet! While Alaska and Louisiana just became the latest states to pass laws banning text-messaging behind the wheel, Virginia resident Leming is still happily texting away while driving despite some near-accidents. 'Sometimes it just seems easier to text 'Be there in 5' instead of calling,' explains Taylor."

Comments

Darwin

[j_sp_r]

Why is it important to text that you'll be there in 5 minutes anyway? You can also wait 5 minutes.

And I hope when he crashes and kills himself he doesn't take others with him. Driving and calling (even hands free), texting, or doing anything else (tuning the radio, setting up your nav system) for that matter is just dangerous.

Re:Darwin

[Anonymous Coward]

God: Where are you?

Idiot: Be there in 5 mins.

CRASH!! BANG!!

Makes sense to me.

Re:Darwin

[eugene ts wong]

God: Where are you?

Idiot: Be there in 5 mins.

CRASH!! BANG!!

God: That didn't seem like 5 minutes to me.

Re:Darwin

[Daengbo]

Driving and calling (even hands free), texting, or doing anything else (tuning the radio, setting up your nav system) for that matter is just dangerous.

My taxi driver the other day was obsessed with his nav system while driving me home -- He was playing solitaire on it. If I had been able to communicate with him, I would have cursed him out.

Re:Darwin

[gemada]

The best example yet of this occurred here in Canada. A teenage girl was driving her parents' minivan and got into an accident while texting her boyfriend.....and here is the kicker....HE WAS IN THE BACK SEAT!

Re:Darwin

[cyberwench]

And yet, barely anyone gives a second thought to tuning their radio while driving or talking to a passenger while driving - both things that are shown to create just as much of a distraction.

I don't think there's anyone out there who never ever deals with distractions while driving. Having a sandwich, drinking something, changing tracks on a CD, driving while not having enough sleep... everyone does it on one level or another. All of it is dangerous, but the only thing that seems to get people keyed up is cell phone use. Can anyone explain to me why?

Re:Darwin

[Free the Cowards]

People who use their phones while driving don't grasp how dangerous it is.

I'll tune my radio on the road, but only when I'm in a clear patch when nothing is happening at the moment. I also take as little time as possible to do so; all of my favorite stations are programmed into buttons, so it just takes a moment, and doesn't take much attention.

The same is true with my passengers. When the driving gets tough, I will stop talking to them, often in mid-sentence.

But people who use cell phones on the road don't seem to understand these ideas. They will frequently place the cell phone first, driving second. They won't interrupt their conversation for a difficult section of driving, they won't try to minimize their conversation, and to compound it all they frequently have only one hand free for actual driving, which means less steering control and poor or nonexistent use of turn signals.

Re:Darwin

[brownsteve]

The girl's name is Taylor Leming. This cannot be a coincidence.

Re:Darwin

[Stickerboy]

>And yet, barely anyone gives a second thought to tuning their radio while driving or talking to a passenger while driving - both things that are shown to create just as much of a distraction.

I don't think there's anyone out there who never ever deals with distractions while driving. Having a sandwich, drinking something, changing tracks on a CD, driving while not having enough sleep... everyone does it on one level or another. All of it is dangerous, but the only thing that seems to get people keyed up is cell phone use. Can anyone explain to me why?

Mostly because it's the bigger idiots that try to text message while driving. There seems to be a tiered system of stupidity while driving. On one level there's the eating a sandwich or sucking on a soda pop or leaning over to tune the radio. On a higher level of idiocy, there's the people reading a newspaper, doing makeup, driving without your seatbelt, and texting or calling on a cell phone.

Unlike talking to a passenger, who should have a nominal idea of what's going on in traffic, the person on the other end of a call has no sense of when they should shut up or avoid bringing up issues requiring heavy thought. I have no problem with someone making an essential short call when it's safe to say, "Hey Dave, the meeting is canceled today. See you", and then hanging up. It's just that most people who I actually see talking on their cellphones in traffic aren't that bright, and continue to natter on forever while they're swerving and stomping on their brakes.

The title of the Facebook group says it all about the people who text message while driving. "Haven't died, yet!" Congratulations... you win the dumb luck award? Soon to turn into another Award?

Re:Darwin

[Drakonik]

Because to use your cell-phone for texting, you must look AWAY FROM THE ROAD and at a small screen to read texts.

When you're talking to a passenger, yeah, you're distracted, but talking and listening does not require that you take your eyes off the road. Nor does adjusting the radio, once you're used to using it.

Re:Darwin

[canUbeleiveIT]

Pedant is also a noun.

Re:Darwin

[Gewalt]

6 billion years didn't seem like a week either.

Re:Darwin

[eugene ts wong]

I don't want to discourage you from being a skeptic. By all means, be a skeptic. ;^) But did you even read what he said? He said, "Canadians". ;^p

Re:Darwin

[Free the Cowards]

You know what else is dangerous? Driving.

I'm not saying that I'm safe while other people are not. I'm saying that there are things you can do to limit your distraction and reduce the danger of the activity. The problem is that people who talk on cell phones while driving by and large do not do these things. Some of them do, and are thereby reasonably safe, and I have no problem with them.

Re:Darwin

[Fjandr]

Phone talkers who only phone while on straightaways and only press one button to do it (speed dial) can make exactly the same argument. Guess what? It's still dangerous. Changing the radio station while driving is dangerous. Period.

Talking on the phone engages your attention for a continuous period of time. A half-second to push a button != several minutes of distraction. Not saying the momentary distraction is not dangerous, but it does not even come close to approaching the level of danger that talking on the phone while driving presents.

Text messaging is even worse though, since it requires the concentration to produce the text mentally (much more thought intensive than speaking naturally) and some form of error correction (or worse, watching your phone constantly as you enter text). Sadly, these people don't always have one-party crashes. If they only killed themselves in car crashes, I'd be fine with it.

Idiot

[jrothwell97]

despite some near-accidents

Enough said.

Also, just because someone hasn't had an accident in the past, it doesn't mean they won't have an accident in the future.

Re:Idiot

[iPodUser]

Exactly. If they've already had near accidents then it's just a matter of time until something bad happens. And so help me if they crash into me...

Re:Idiot

[tonycheese]

Did ANY of you actually RTFA (including the person who submitted it???)? Clearly, the group was created as a joke and she said in the article that she supports the law even if it would be hard to enforce. She says that although she does do it sometimes, she realizes it's stupid and dangerous and would follow the law if it were to become one.

Re:Idiot

[jrothwell97]

But surely if she considers it irresponsible, she shouldn't do it, EVEN if it is not specifically illegal?

Kids these days

[iPodUser]

I can't believe these people! What's so "fun" about text messages? Why the aversion to real communication? I'd much rather talk to someone than exchange emoticons while risking the lives of those on the road around me.

Re:Kids these days

[Yosho]

I agree. I just don't have time for text messages. It can take an hour of back and forth to have a two minute conversation. I can barely put up with IM, but it is required in our office so that people can interrupt your train of thought if you accidentally get on a productive streak.
I have no "text plan" on my phone, so incoming texts that I didn't ask to receive cost me 15 cents. Outgoing don't cost me anything because I don't do them. I don't have time. Life is too short for text messaging. Call up, get your conversation done and move on.

As you honestly don't seem to understand the use of text messages, I'll explain why I find them useful: for communicating small amounts of information that don't require conversation, and out of respect for the other person's time.

Let's face it, most people don't want to be interrupted whenever they're doing something. You might be out shopping for groceries, visiting a friend's house, or eating a restaurant, and you probably have your phone with you in case there's an emergency and/or you need to call somebody, but you don't want somebody to call you and suddenly want to have a conversation. Heck, at least in those situations you can talk if you want to; you can't exactly answer your phone and have a conversation at all if, say, you're watching a presentation at work, or if you're already on the phone with somebody else.

When you get a text message, rather than answering your phone immediately, you can view it at your leisure, and it only takes a second of your time to read it. I can tell my girlfriend, "working late tonight, I'll be home in an hour," or my D&D buddies, "On my way, be there 30 minutes," or a couple of my coworkers, "Meet for lunch at Rudy's BBQ", and it only takes ten seconds of my time and effectively none of theirs. I can even send the same message to half a dozen people at once, and that's much faster than calling half a dozen people and repeating the same conversation every time. If, for some reason, they need to answer the message, they can also do so without disturbing any people around them who don't want to listen to somebody chatting on their cell phone.

Does that make more sense? Yes, text messages are a horribly inefficient way of having a conversation, but they're not for conversing, they're for disseminating information.

Get a phone and bluetooth headset

[trolltalk.com]

What a moron!

exting away while driving despite some near-accidents. 'Sometimes it just seems easier to text 'Be there in 5' instead of calling,' explains Taylor

With a bluetooth headset, I say the person's name, my cellphone dials the number, I say what I have to say, and never have to fumble around with the phone.

Any bets on how long before this guy gets his darwin?

Re:Get a phone and bluetooth headset

[ozbon]

If you'd RTFA, you'd know that "this guy" is actually a girl.

TIME's Sarah N. Lynch contacted the group's founder, Taylor Leming, 21, of Round Hill, Va., who submitted her responses via e-mail

Moron

[smolloy]

I hope her first accident, the one that teaches her how dumb and selfish this is, only injures/kills her and no one else.

I also hope her insurance company reads time.com.

Re:Moron

[owlstead]

You learn or you die, you cannot combine the two. Anyway, I hope she crashes and just seriously damages the car, with the insurance company not paying out. There is no reason to wish her harm just because she (at 21 years old) makes some stupid mistakes.

As has often be said

[Anonymous Coward]

the really effective way to make people drive more careful is to replace the airbag in all cars with a big pointy spike aimed at the driver's head.

Great Idea...

[deadmongrel]

I am starting another group:
  "I am drunk While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet!"

It sucks that we have to make laws to compensate for commonsense.

Stop killing people

[Joe the Lesser]

I've lost two people in pointless car crashes.

Please use your goddamn head and pay attention to the goddamn road.

Re:Why such a specific law?

[trolltalk.com]

Why not simply have a law where you must drive with "due care and attention".

Too vague ... one person's "due care and attention" is anothers recklessness.

Besides, banning texting for the driver while on a highway is a no-brainer ... because obviously people with no brains think they can do it "despite a few near-accidents."

I finally bought a bluetooth earpiece when the laws changed, even though my cell already has speaker-phone capability, so it already was "hands-free"; after a couple of weeks, I now wish I had bought it sooner. (Hint - buy a good-quality one with noise and echo cancellation - you don't want to sound like you're talking in a garbage can).

Here's A Challenge For The Statisticians...

[DieByWire]

Given that at some point the rate of new members signing up will equal the rate that existing members die, calculate the maximum number of members of 'I Text Message People While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet!'

Don't make me hurt you...

[astralan]

It's thrilling to think of driving south on I-95 in the left lane and see someone driving five feet behind me staring at a phone than my bumper. Isn't that how road-rage gets started? It's more than an accident waiting to happen.

Re:Make Organ Donor Mandatory for These Idiots!

[gnasher719]

I would like to make organ donation compulsory for these people. At least they can be of some use after they crash.

I like the idea of compulsory organ donation, but why wait until after they crash, when the organs might get damaged?

Hey Taylor, out of the gene pool!

[Max von H.]

I nearly got killed a few years ago by a "distracted" driver who was happily chatting on his cell phone while running a traffic light. It took me over a year to recover and be able to work again and I'll feel the secondary effects of this accident for the rest of my life (definitely NOT a nice thing, trust me).

In most European countries, using a cell phone while driving is considered impaired driving and you basically face the same consequences as if you were drunk in case of an accident, meaning your insurance will happily run away from you and you'll be declared responsible for the accident even if it's not initially your fault.

I'm looking forward to the day it'll be the same here in Ontario as a lot of people don't seem to be able to distract themselves from their crackberries while driving. Maybe a $1000 ticket and a license suspension will teach them a lesson before they get to injure or kill someone.

I for one hope this moron eliminates himself from the human gene pool without injuring or killing someone first.

Calvin

[Rob the Bold]

Text used to be a noun, now it's used both interchangeably as a verb and a noun. So many words in modern English are starting to be used like this.

Verbing weirds language.

Cognitive load

[Dire Bonobo]

the only thing that seems to get people keyed up is cell phone use. Can anyone explain to me why?

Higher cognitive load.

Carrying on a conversation is more mentally taxing than turning a radio dial, and isn't as interruptable, since you're only in control of half of it. See, for example, this research:

"the Carnegie Mellon study, for the first time, used brain imaging to document that listening alone reduces by 37 percent the amount of brain activity associated with driving. This can cause drivers to weave out of their lane, based on the performance of subjects using a driving simulator."

Re:Cognitive load

[camperdave]

The problem isn't the cell phone. It isn't the radio. It's the fact that the majority of driving does not require a lot of concentration. It has a low cognitive load. Thus drivers have a lot of free attention that needs to be channeled into something: listening to the radio, talking on the phone, etc. Otherwise they get bored and sleepy. That's why a lot of highways have rumble strips on along the side.

The problem occurs when driving suddenly requires a lot more concentration/attention than we have to give it. If we can't shift mental gears fast enough to act to avoid a situation, we crash.

Striking Back at Traffic Threats

[Doc Ruby]

I drive a motorcycle in NYC, which is already really dangerous even when people are running only one machine, their car. It's even worse now that people are in their SUVs, sealed from the rest of the world and throwing their weight around in traffic - especially when they're not really NYC residents, but drive those trucks mostly in the suburbs where there's room for them to drive like fools. It's even worse than that with them talking to their phones pressed to their heads, distracted by what's in their hands rather than concentrating with their hands on the wheel. The worst are the SUV drivers with phones in their hands, and of course the very worst are the ones with both hands on a phone, looking at it while they text someone. It's totally insane, though they don't care since they feel like their giant truck will protect them in a collision.

A month ago, one of these assholes cut me off downtown, almost driving me into a parked car (except I'm a very good driver, so I barely recovered to save my life). They raced to the next red light, which was only a block away anyway. I drove up next to their window and waved at them. I wanted to tell them to watch out, as most of them just aren't aware of motorcycles at all, which don't register in their vision like cars do. They were busy texting someone, as they'd clearly been while they cut me off, and they ignored me. So I knocked on their window. They ignored me. I knocked harder, angrily now. They glanced up at me, obviously having seen me the entire time, and waved one hand, mockingly making an "oh, I'm scared" face (even though I wasn't threatening them or anything). They laughed silently inside their big truck, and bent back down to resume texting.

So I bashed off their side rearview mirror. I ripped it from the truck, and smashed at their truck over and over again while they watched in shock.

Then I drove away and got lost among NYC's millions of other cars. Fixing that mirror's got to cost hundreds of dollars and days off the road. If only I could have smashed their window and grabbed their phone, I'd call to check in on how it's going. Maybe next time. If they haven't learned to just shut up and drive already.