Siri's Creator Challenges Texting-While-Driving Study

waderoush writes "A rash of media reports last week, reporting on a study released by the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, implied that using voice-to-text apps like Siri or Vlingo while driving is no safer than manual texting. But Adam Cheyer, the co-inventor of Siri, says journalists took the wrong message from the study, which didn't test Siri or Vlingo in the recommended hands-free, eyes-free mode. In the study, researchers asked subjects to drive a closed course while they held an iPhone or Android phone in one hand, spoke messages into Siri or Vlingo, proofread the messages visually, and pressed buttons to send the messages. Under these conditions, driver response times were delayed by nearly a factor of two, the researchers found. 'Of course your driving performance is going to be degraded if you're reading screens and pushing buttons,' says Cheyer, who joined Apple in 2010 as part of the Siri acquisition and left the company two years later. To study whether voice-to-text apps are really safer than manual texting, he says, the Texas researchers should have tested Siri and Vlingo in car mode, where a Bluetooth headset or speakers are used to minimize visual and manual interaction. 'The study seems to have misunderstood how Siri was designed to be used,' Cheyer says. 'I don't think that there is any evidence that shows that if Siri and other systems are used properly in eyes-free mode, they are 'just as risky as texting.''"

Comments

Driving Performance

[CanHasDIY]

Of course your driving performance is going to be degraded if you're reading screens and pushing buttons,'

See, shit like this is why the Prophet Hicks was so adamant in his belief that advertising people should do the world a favor and kill themselves.

FYI, asshole, it's an issue because humans cannot multitask, and every second you pay attention to that goddamn toy is one more second you're not paying attention to the road.

Perhaps Mr. My-Sales-Figures-Are-More-Important-Than-Your-Safety should read the stacks upon stacks of other studies that prove any distraction from driving is dangerous. Even talking to the guy in the passenger seat.

Re:one more distraction while driving

[characterZer0]

The sound quality coming from other people in the car is great. The sound quality from your phone is compartively terrible. Your brain has to do a lot of extra work to parse language coming from a low-quality source, which impairs your ability to drive. I would be interested in a comparison between talking on the phone and listening to AM talk radio.