> Cell phones are not dangerous because the driver was looking at his phone or playing with the buttons when he had an accident. They are dangerous because they encourage your mind to wander.
I'm going to speculate that driving is such an activity that doesn't require constant attention and involves quite a bit of monotony. In such circumstances, mind wandering will happen—be there a mobile phone, Navdy, or nothing at all.
This is a human factor. The only complete solution to this issue seems to be self-driving cars, when your mind and its wandering are taken out of equation.
With that in mind, a mobile phone doesn't seem to stand equal to other causes of mind-wandering, contrary to your claim. A phone also obstructs large portions of the road from your view when you're using it.
> I'm going to speculate that driving is such an activity that doesn't require constant attention...
Stop there. What would lead you to this speculation?
Of course driving requires constant attention and care, the full time you are behind the wheel of an automobile. You're piloting a 2 ton machine made of whirling metal and filled with flammable liquid traveling at high speeds, usually within less than a meter of someone else doing the same.
There is never a good reason to divert attention from the task of driving while you are driving. Full stop.
> Stop there. What would lead you to this speculation?
First, I should've put “constant and full attention” there. My phrasing was off. As to why I came to this conclusion:
1. People often ride for a few hours without breaks. My assumption is that it's not possible to pay constant and full attention throughout this time—our minds are bound to wander.
2. The pattern I usually observe is when the driver, depending on road situation, varies the degree of attention they pay to the driving. At one time they're driving relaxedly and multitasking (talking to a passenger or someone on the phone—by definition they're not paying their full attention at this time), while at another they're more or less concentrated on the road.
Disclaimer—I don't myself drive a car, but I often observe people driving. I've observed both experienced drivers who drive frequently and more beginning drivers, the pattern described under (2) is the same.
Update: the comments here, coupled with my observations, make me believe—roughly—that a) drivers don't (can't) pay their full and constant attention to the road, and b) many are in denial of (a).
That reminds me of the pope, doesn't play the game but tells others how to play it.
Well, I do. I drive way too much in fact and I believe strongly that driving is a full-time 100% on the ball occupation. That probably saved my life twice this year alone and prevented one other probably bad accident from happening. I drive in places where traffic is very much unlike the traffic that you are probably used to (you'd call it a madhouse), dogs, other drivers, horse carts, madmen, trucks overtaking in blind corners, drunk people on the road (on bicycles, no lights). You name it they've got it here.
When I'm tired even a little bit I stop the car and sleep until I feel rested again. My phone is off. At night I use the GPS to tell me what's going to happen around the corner (hairpins in mountainous terrain where you can't stop are a real joy) when I can't find a place to stop safely to overnight. But as soon as I do the car gets stopped and I wait until it's light again.
I turn down the instrument panel lights to have good night vision as much as possible, this is plenty to read the instruments by if I have to and means I get to see what's on the road, which is a lot more important than whatever is on that screen. (Such as a very black and very large dog that jumped out of nowhere a few weeks ago).
This probably all may seem paranoid but it has served me very well over the years. Even so, I think that navdy has a spot, but only if you use it as a navigation device and place it outside of your direct field of vision. It screws up your night vision and that's bad enough when you have to look at it, it's much worse when that happens all the time.
The idea of 100% attention when thinking about the brain is just a simplistic notion to make discussions easier but inaccurate. Even in this simplistic approximation of the brain, the idea of 100% attention is pretty thin. If I'm driving somewhere I'm probably listening to the radio (deduct 5% attention points!) or thinking about wherever it is I am heading (deduct 5% attention points!) or if someone is actually in the car with me, I am probably interacting with them in some way (deduct 10% attention points!). And while I'm driving and keeping a constant vigil through the windshield for danger what if I see a glorious new Apple store that I didn't know existed?? That is going to hijack my brain for a bit (deduct 100% attention points!).
The radio , passengers and thoughts are much more passive and easy to tune out but even then I'm sure there have been plenty of accidents that are caused by daydreaming. A passenger can see out of the window and has awareness of the car's surroundings so they will usually know to shut up or at least not expect a quick answer to their question if you are doing a tricky manoeuvre. Electronic devices or people on the other end of a hands-free conversation both require interaction and do not have awareness of the situation that the driver is in.
I do drive myself. Have for 20+ years. Just drove 1300 miles over the summer vacation, sometimes on long monotonous roads, and I'd be lying if I was paying full attention all the time.
My experience is exactly as he describes. In city traffic, at traffic lights, or just before an exit, my full attention is required and constant (I actually dislike GPS because of this, it distracts, especially if notifications are late, I'm looking at you Google Nav - 'keep left at the fork').
However, after so many years of driving, I have also developed some sort of autopilot/'trance driving' mode. It is typically engaged on long legs, or when extremely tired on a very familiar route (e.g. going home). I betcha if you ask professional drivers like truckers, they'll tell you the same.
Edit: While in this mode, my 'look-ahead' window is maximized. I gaze much further ahead than I do in 'stress' situations. My focus point is definitely way past the windshield, usually several cars ahead of me. I gauge my speed by engine sound, distance to the cars ahead of me, local traffic flow etc etc. As such, I am not convinced that this heads-up display approach is a safety improvement. Sure, your eyes will be on the road, but by requiring a change of focus, you cannot look ahead to anticipate issues/changes/risks.
I have to agree. I do drive like this too over long distances. Anything else would just be too tiring. Maybe we expand the zone of perceived predictability. Fascinating stuff. Good point about having to focus in and out.
This plus Highway Hypnosis [1] show that some of us at least drive without full conscious attention.
You're going to get yourself or someone else killed one day. Remember that I can do everything in my power to be a responsible driver I am still subject to the sum total of the risks everybody else takes and driving when you're that tired is an un-acceptable risk.
Hate to be the type that pulls this one out, but when I became a parent I learned of levels of tiredness I never knew existed, and became aware of a whole segment of society (the parents) who go through most activities in their life at near crippling levels of tiredness. I agree it gets dangerous but it's not feasible to keep them off the road.
> Disclaimer—I don't myself drive a car, but I often observe people driving. I've observed both experienced drivers who drive frequently and more beginning drivers, the pattern described under (2) is the same.
When you're driving without distractions, sure, your mind wanders. You're thinking about a date tonight, or that jerk at work, or whatever. But as soon as your eyes pick up something of interest, like an exit sign, another driver, or a bad situation up ahead, you can immediately focus exclusively on the road. You can do this pretty quickly
Similarly, when you're carrying on a conversation with someone, the other person will generally quiet down as soon as the situation changes.
When you're on a cell phone, that changes. You're paying much, much more attention to a cell phone conversation than you are to someone sitting next to you because you have to listen harder. Not only that, the conversation is independent of the driving situation. Most people will not tell the guy on the phone with them to shut up; they'll just try to carry on the conversation. Even worse, a lot of people aren't paying enough attention to the road to realize that the situation requires more attention and that they need to put down the phone. This causes accidents.
Finally, texting is the worst - you're literally taking your eyes off the road to send a message.
Peak Hacker News/Silicon Valley: I have no idea how this system works, in fact, I've never used it. But I'm going to speculate on how it can be improved anyway.
I for one, completely agree with you. Now this is purely anecdotal, but then again everything in this debate seems to be.
I've only been driving for 7 years, but already had several benign accidents (no casualties or whatever, only some damaged metal). On each and every one of these situations, the cause was not speeding, nor my phone, nor any outside distraction, but just my mind wandering off the driving and thinking of something else.
Sometimes I get home and I do not remember the ride, not even which road I took or anything, and I think to myself, what could have happened while my mind was wandering. I just can't keep my full attention on something for that long, period.
For what it's worth, I remember reading two things:
1. Driving is one of those activities where people actually use a lot of their brains functions to do. This is partly why it can tire you out so much.
2. People speaking to a passenger drive as poorly as people otherwise impaired but the fact that they're both in the car (grounding them in the fact that they're in the vehicle) and that both of them pay some attention to the road helps mitigate the negative effects.
All I can recall is that I read #1 in a BBC News article and the latter on something I found on Google Scholar. I feel they're relevant. If you're interested, I hope it helps.
So maybe your should learn driving a car first. I agree that paying full attention while driving is definitely the hard thing to do, but it is also the right thing to do.
One of the problems is that whatever you happen to be focusing on, you also have to be able to react quickly to potential hazards. I'm pretty sure (guessing) that being not particularly focused on the road is still significantly better than being focused on a mobile phone/Navdy.
I've read the literature on multitasking while driving. Texting is one of the worst. Talking on the phone comes somewhere in the middle (hands free or not doesn't seem to matter), but even talking to passengers has a measurable decrease in safety. The problem is that people, as a whole, are willing to bear quite a bit of risk in order to indulge in their distractions, but their behavior additionally forces those around them to bear some of the risk as well.
I agree that self-driving cars are a huge way forward for safety, but in the meantime it makes sense to minimize human error.
> One of the problems is that whatever you happen to be focusing on, you also have to be able to react quickly to potential hazards.
True. From my anecdotal observation the reason why talking over mobile phone is dangerous (while talking to a passenger is not) seems to be social norms—immediately cutting off the conversation to focus on the road doesn't seem like an acceptable thing to do, and we avoid doing this unless absolutely necessary. For a more responsible driver, this ‘absolutely necessary’ threshold is pretty low—as it should be—but such people seem to be rare.
First, road accidents are are among top 10 causes of deaths in the world, so this isn't a small matter.
Second, there is research that shows that dividing your attention just between driving and talking can cause a significant reduction of reaction speed. Driving safely is not monotonous activity. Of course, if your car is crawling in a LA traffic jam, accidents are mostly non-fatal, but when you are driving 100km/h, cars are dangerous objects.
Driving safely on an empty freeway at 100km/h is one of the most monotonous things I can think of. Hell, if it's a straight flat section of road you are literally doing nothing except trying to stay alert in case something changes. The human brain (or at least mine) is not good at staying in a focused hyper-aware state for a long period of time while nothing's happening.
I believe that accidents caused by distracting devices are only a small % (really small) of this trend. The huge % of car accidents is because of alcohol abuse.
Your speculation is mostly right. Our brains are pretty good at automating repetitive tasks such as driving, so most drivers regularly don't pay complete attention.
The trouble is our brains primarily adapt to repeated stimuli eg driving in good conditions. Since no one spends most of their time driving narrowly avoiding accidents, that activity isn't one the brain can learn to automate ( well, maybe it's possible with a realistic driving simulator), so dangerous driving requires everyone's full attention.
Since we don't usually have advanced warning of when dangerous driving will happen, the best we can do is spend as much time as possible paying attention to road conditions.
this may get me down-voted, but i tend to drive faster and more aggressively than, uh say, my parent's would like me to [1]. when i'm driving this way, i'm fully engaged and almost always "in the zone." i constantly work towards a better position and continuously work to predict actions of all cars around me and the consequent reactions of other cars to that action, as well as any reactions i'd make at any point. my mental model of traffic is largely based on fluid dynamics, w/ hooke's law (springs) thrown in for stop/go traffic. i often joke w/ my wife that if there were an olympic event for navigating through traffic, i'd at least qualify for the team. while risks are greater than going 65 in a 65 and not changing lanes, i'm never ever reckless. some may disagree, but b/c of the heightened level of engagement, i do consider my self far safer than other cars on the road who commute home, thinking about work and largely disengaged. day dreaming? can't. texting, etc? cant. drinking coffee? can't. fwiw, i've always driven a car with a manual transmission, and i do feel it's a variable in lower levels of driver disengagement. i've never had an accident or ticket while driving in this manner.
driver disengagement is the problem, whether caused by a physical, visual, or cognitive distraction. the goal shouldn't be weighting how dangerous these various devices are, it should be on how to ensure drivers are engaged to a point where they can take over from auto-pilot (repetitive aspect) when something goes wrong.
[1] i'm not a kid, i have many kids of my own, just trying to avoid quantification of driving.
I'm going to speculate that driving is such an activity that doesn't require constant attention and involves quite a bit of monotony. In such circumstances, mind wandering will happen—be there a mobile phone, Navdy, or nothing at all.
This is a human factor. The only complete solution to this issue seems to be self-driving cars, when your mind and its wandering are taken out of equation.
With that in mind, a mobile phone doesn't seem to stand equal to other causes of mind-wandering, contrary to your claim. A phone also obstructs large portions of the road from your view when you're using it.