Distracted Driving Effects and Why No One Should Do It

Texting and driving is a greatly increasing problem around the world. People are addicted to their phones and some people can’t get off them even when their life is on the line. As a high school student, adults always tell us we are addicted to our phones. While many kids are addicted to their phones, adults are just as guilty. Teenagers and adults are all guilty for being at least a little addicted to their phones. This very serious and dangerous problem is carrying over to the roads. There are people who get behind the wheel and text and drive. According to studies, “97% of teens agree that texting while driving is dangerous, yet 43% do it anyway. 19% of drivers of all ages admit to surfing the web while driving.” When texting and driving your odds of crashing are at least 6 times greater than when you drive drunk. Think about that for a second. Texting on your phone is 600% more dangerous than being drunk and getting behind the wheel. That is a scary statistic. Also, 1 in every 4 crashes are caused purely by texting while driving. If you have to respond to someone via text, it is smarter to pull over instead of risking your life for one text. Fatalities involving texting while driving comprised 9% of all fatal crashes nationwide. 9 Americans a day die from distracted driving. You only get one life and risking it over a text does not seem like a very good idea. You want to live your life and if you text and drive it could be the last time you ever send a text. The National Safety Council says that texting while driving leads to around 1.6 million crashes each year. Nearly 390,000 injuries occur each year from accidents caused by texting while driving. Not only do you put your life at risk you also put others lives at risk. You can hurt and even kill people. You can hurt mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, and any other person you can think of. If they get hurt that affects whole families and communities. If someone said they were going to punch a loved one in your life, you would do something about it. So why wouldn’t you do something about people potentially killing a loved one in your life because they want to send a text. Texting and driving is selfish and shows that you don’t care about others lives and families. If you want to help save lives, do your part and stay off your phone while driving. Another reason to stay off your phone is if you get caught texting and driving you can get fined and points will be added to your license. One way to avoid texting and driving is to recognize the risks. By recognizing your risks it will influence you to make the right decision of not texting and driving. Another way to avoid texting and driving is to keep your phone out of sight. If you don’t have access to your phone you won’t look at it while driving. If you need to send a text, ask a passenger if they can send it for you. If you can’t stay off your phone even with the precautions I have listed, you probably shouldn’t be allowed to drive. The most frequent cause of a car crash is a recognition error by the driver. This is the driver’s inattention to internal and external distractions. Some others call it inadequate surveillance of your surroundings. In the article The Real Reason You Shouldn’t Text While Driving it states,”while there are very few magic numbers in life, there is a magic number associated with how many things we can attend to at once. And it’s not a lot.”(Aline Holzwarth). Many people can hardly pay attention to one thing at once, and people still try to drive a multiple thousand pound metal vehicle while not even paying attention where they are going. To me that does not sound like the safest idea to keep yourself and other drivers alive. Recently someone on a motorcycle in front of my neighborhood was killed due to the driver not paying attention and being distracted. The person who hit the motorcyclist could have easily prevented this by just paying attention and being aware of their surroundings. To do my part I am going to always put my phone away when driving and if I need to access it I will pull over and turn off my car before even touching my phone. In the end texting and driving is a selfish and wrong thing to do. It is proven with statistics and studies from trusted professionals. Never text and drive and you’ll know you are making a positive impact on the world and doing your part in preventing more accidents from this growing problem. I know it may be hard to put down your phone sometimes, but It can save lives.