Many teens are afflicted with the dangerous notion that they are invincible. In other words, they just don’t think (insert dangerous behavior here) will result in something bad happening to them. Pair that up with being in the technological age where we are constantly buried in our wireless technology, and it can be a recipe for disaster.
But sometimes low-tech behavior can pose just as much of a risk. For instance, a new study from the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center has found that teen drivers with loud or rowdy passengers have a higher risk for an accident than when they are distracted by technology.
The study involved 52 teen drivers in North Carolina, most of whom had just gotten their license. Cameras were mounted in each vehicle, which recorded their driving activities (with audio) for over six months. While the cameras were continuously active, they only recorded when the cameras' momentum reached a certain threshold, then recorded for 20 seconds.
About 24,000 clips of the drivers were captured over six months. The most common distracted driving behavior was as follows: