With the increased usage of cell phones in cars, more and more accidents are being attributed to distracted driving in vehicles. Distracted driving is considered "any non-driving activity a person engages in while operating a motor vehicle". Distracted driving includes text messaging and talking on a mobile device and accounts for 80% of all automobile accidents. For more information, please visit http://www.distraction.gov

Laws regarding Distracted Driving:
Laws for distracted driving vary from state to state. In Louisiana, it is illegal for anyone under 17 to use a cell phone while driving. Class E drivers are prohibited from using a cell phone while driving and can be fined up to $500 if found guilty. Additionally, school bus drivers are prohibited from using a cellular device en route. For more information on these laws, please visit http://www.drivinglaws.org/la.php  and http://www.drivinglaws.org/teen/lateen.php.

On January 26, 2010, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced a federal ban on texting for commercial truck drivers which includes big rigs and buses. Commercial vehicles that do not comply to these regulations can be subjected to fines up to $2, 750 and face civil and criminal charges (Source: http://ww.distraction.gov)

Surprising facts you may not know about distracted driving:

• Using a cell phone while driving can delay a driver's reactions as much as having a blood alcohol concentration at the legal limit of .08 percent. (Source: University of Utah)
• 80 percent of all crashes and 65 percent of near crashes involve some type of distraction. (Source: Virginia Tech 100-car study for NHTSA)
• Driving while using a cell phone reduces the amount of brain activity associated with driving by 37%. (Source: Carnegie Mellon University)
• Drivers that use handheld devices are four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves. (Source: Institute for Highway Safety)
• Drivers who text while driving are more than 20 times more likely to get in an accident than non-distracted drivers (Source: Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration)
• Drivers who talk on a cell phone are four times more likely to be in an accident than drivers who don't (New England Journal of Medicine 1997).

Please view the following research videos from the Applied Cognition Lab in the Department of Psychology at the University of Utah regarding the unsafe results from drivers that are distracted while driving.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE VIDEOS