The School of Nursing and Perelman School of Medicine led a team of researchers in a recent study that found a correlation between handheld cellphone use and risky driving behaviors by new teen drivers.
This study, published by JAMA Network Open on Oct. 17 and supported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, tracked the driving habits of 119 Pennsylvania teens aged 16 and a half to 17 who had been licensed for less than a year. The researchers used the smartphone telematics application Way to Drive, which was developed at Penn and produced by Cambridge Mobile Telematics, to collect data over a 60-day period.
Way to Drive measured kinematic risky driving events — rapid acceleration and hard braking — per 100 miles driven. The app was found to be 97% accurate in a validation study that monitored times when the phone was handheld.
The app found handheld cellphone use in 34.1% of trips and speeding in 43.9% of trips. KRD events occurred in 10.9% of all trips, corresponding to 2.65 KRD events per 100 miles driven. Individual characteristics were not found to be associated with KRD events, but driving behaviors were. Handheld cellphone use occurred for an average of 2.1 minutes of a 15-minute trip, pointing to a trend among adolescents.
The lead author of the study, Catherine McDonald, is the Dr. Hildegarde Reynolds Endowed Term Chair of Primary Care Nursing, chair of Penn Nursing’s Department of Family and Community Health, and co-director of the Penn Injury Science Center. McDonald emphasized the importance of family awareness when teens begin to drive.
“Sometimes we think that new drivers, in those really early months, may be abstaining from using their cell phone because they're really concentrating on the driving task," McDonald told The Daily Pennsylvanian, "And we saw that even our newest drivers were using their cell phone.”
The study’s researchers provided recommendations such as developing strategies for avoiding cellphone use while driving, and informing teens on the dangers of driving while using a cellphone. McDonald noted that adults can also model safe driving behaviors for their teens.
“It’s crucial for teens and their parents to be aware of the risks and to take steps to avoid using their phones while driving,” McDonald said. “By identifying risky behaviors, we can develop targeted interventions to help teens become safer drivers.”
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