More Adult Motorists than Teens May Be Texting While Driving, Finds New Survey

According to a survey conducted by AT & T, 49% of the adult motorists that participated said the have texted while driving. Compare that to 43% of teen drivers that were asked in another survey in 2012. 98% of all respondents said they know that distracted driving is unsafe.

Multitasking is never beneficial while behind the steering wheel of the car. At Altman & Altman, our Boston personal injury lawyers represent clients who suffered serious injuries because of a distracted driving. Texting, talking on the cell phone, reading, surfing the Internet, and sending emails while driving can lead to catastrophic Massachusetts car crashes.

Per the At & T report, which is part of its “It Can Wait” campaign to get drivers to stop texting while behind the wheel, the number of motorists that text appears to be going up instead of down. Out of every 10 respondents, six of them said they didn’t text while driving three years ago. Meantime, 40% of those that do text while driving admit that this is an actual habit rather than a rare occurrence.

Considering that texting motorists have a 23 times greater chance of getting into a car accident than drivers who don’t text, that there are more drivers engaging in this distracted driving habit now, even with recent efforts by the federal and state governments to make sure people are aware of the dangers, is disturbing news. Also, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that there were 3,267 distracted driving fatalities in 2010 and then that number went up in 2011 with 3,331 distracted driving deaths.

It is also interesting to note that US drivers email and text more than motorists that live in a number of Western European countries. Per data, in 2011 69% of American motorists admitted to having talked on their cell phones while operating a motor vehicle in the previous 30 days. Compare that to 21-59% of drivers from these other nations.

Contact our Boston car accident law firm today.

Survey: Adults text more than teens while driving, CNN, March 28, 2013

It Can Wait Campaign , AT & T
More U.S. drivers texting, chatting than Western Europeans: CDC, Reuters, March 14, 2013

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