Driven to distraction
Vast majority of youngsters text behind the wheel, study finds
Anything that is being done in a vehicle that distracts you from focusing on driving and the cars around you is problematic
A FEAR of being confronted by an angry spouse is one of the main reasons drivers tend to text behind the wheel.
This is one of the findings of a survey about texting and driving conducted by the Shallcross Youth Movement in Chatsworth. The results showed that 86% of people texted while driving.
In many cases, said Previn Vedan, a member of the movement, the culprits were afraid of missing messages from their partners and facing anger once they got home.
“There are a lot of justifications for the texting,” said Vedan. “A lot of them said they texted when they were going home from work and their wives SMSed to say that they needed something from the shops.”
The survey was conducted among 450 people over two weekends earlier this month. Although it is ongoing, the movement has been releasing the findings on its Facebook page.
According to the results so far, young people are emerging as the worst culprits.
Drivers between the ages of 18 and 35 made up 67% of the sample group. Among this group, 97% said they texted while driving and 45% spoke on the phone. Tellingly, 97% of this age group also had no problem texting while driving passengers in a vehicle, suggesting peer censure is not an issue.
By comparison, in the 50 and older category, which made up 14% of the survey, 28% texted, 36% spoke on the phone and 14% texted when driving others.
The movement’s findings matched those of an international survey in September last year that revealed South Africans’ fondness for using their cellphones while driving.
At 41%, South Africa was the second-worst behind Saudi Arabia (43%) in a 24-country poll by global market and opinion research firm Ipsos OTX.
The survey polled 14 160 drivers from around the world. Other countries surveyed included Russia, Brazil, the UK, US, India and China.
The Road Traffic Management Corporation’s Gilberto Martins said texting while driving was a problem on South African roads.
“It is very difficult to look at this as a research topic, because you need to have a proper base to work from,” he said, acknowledging the lack of official statistics.
“You can sit and watch a highway where people are stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic and [see] people texting and talking. Some are even on their iPads because traffic is moving so slowly.
“It would be very hard to try to quantify the percentage of people doing it. It is a great concern for us that there are numerous distractions that have come into play now in motor vehicles.”
Martins said technology as a whole had created the problem.
“Before, there were no cellphones [but] these cars have video screens, so certainly there are more and more distractions.
“Anything that is being done in a vehicle at high speed or low speed that distracts you from focusing on the actual art of driving and the cars around you is problematic. We do know that it is happening regularly,” he said.
Zakes Sondiyazi of the South African Insurance Association said texting did pose a problem for the insurance industry, but the honesty of drivers made it difficult to determine.
“Such actions do contribute immensely to motor-related claims, but unfortunately customers do not — or would not — divulge that they were texting or talking on the phone when they got involved in an accident because their claim might be rejected,” said Sondiyazi.