A presentation given to the UK Parliamentary Advisory Committee on Transport Safety in March 2015. The talk given by Professor Andrew Parkes of the Transport Research Laboratory traces the impact of driver distraction research on UK policy since his early work in 1990's

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Insert the title of your
presentation here
Presented by Name Here
Job Title - Date
Mobile phones and driver
distraction
Andrew Parkes
18th
March 2015

2. Page  2
A good idea at the time!
Extra information for
drivers is nothing new,
though the practicality
of the Whitehead &
Mason ‘Semper’ map of
1930 was debatable.
The Semper was a
spring-loaded roller
blind overprinted with
a 16-miles-to-the-inch
of England, Scotland
and Wales.

3. 1946 First mobile phone call
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Distraction – definition (Basacik & Stevens, 2008)
 Diversion of attention…
 …away from activities required for safe
driving…
 …due to some event, activity, object or
person, within or outside the vehicle

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Distraction sources (Regan, Young, Lee & Gordon, 2008)
 Six broad categories of distraction…

15. Things brought into the vehicle
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16. Things brought into the vehicle
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17. Vehicle systems
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18. Vehicle occupants
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19. Moving object or animal in vehicle
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20. Internalised activity
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21. External objects, events or activities
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Distraction by mobile phone FAQs
Handsfree is legal so it must be ok?
So should we ban talking to passengers?
What about using the radio?
What can I do? I need to use the time
How does it compare to alcohol?
How does texting compare?

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Propositions
Hands-free is better than hand-held

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Propositions
Hands-free is better than handheld
- only just

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Propositions
Hands-free is better than handheld
- only just
Carphone conversations are no different to
talking to a passenger

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Propositions
Hands-free is better than handheld
- only just
Carphone conversations are no different to
talking to a passenger
- yes they are

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Propositions
Hands-free is better than handheld
- only just
Carphone conversations are no different to
talking to a passenger
- yes they are

28. Brief history
of carphone
research
First Study: Ivan Brown,
Cambridge 1963
US, UK and Swedish
research late 80’s
UK and Dutch work in 90’s
General assumptions:
hands-free better, hands-
free ubiquitous by mid 90’s
In 1990’s we did not predict
current technology and
habits
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Risk
Direct Line survey of 2000 drivers showed
31% use hand held regularly while driving.
Figure rises to 51% of younger drivers
 78% of high mileage driver (over 40,000
miles pa)

30. Risk
4 million company cars in
UK
16% of all miles are
business related
66% of company cars are
subject of insurance claim
each year
Driving now officially most
dangerous activity in
workplace environment
Page  30

31. Page  31
Redelmeier & Tibshirani 1997
699 Toronto drivers who had cellphones and
involved in collisions resulting in property
damage but not personal injury
calls on day of accident and a week before
analysed through billing records
Association between cellular telephone calls and motor vehicle collisions
New England Journal of Medicine 453-458

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results
risk of collision 4 times higher when cell
phone being used
showed raised risk for up to ten minutes after
the call terminated
hands-free had no advantage over hand-held
 39% called emergency services after the crash

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Five relevant UK Studies
 Can people think and negotiate and drive at the same
time?
 Is talking to a passenger the same as talking to
someone on the carphone?
 Comparison of driving with handheld or handsfree
conversations, benchmarked against alcohol
impairment
 What happens to drivers situational awareness even
in handsfree conversations?
 What happens when people text and drive?

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Study 1: Quality of decision making on
phone while driving
 Tried to approach the issue from perspective of how
realistic is the notion of ‘the office on the move’?
 Not just can you drive while talking, but can you have
an involved conversation while driving?
Parkes, A. M., (1991), The effects of driving and handsfree telephone use on conversation structure and
style. Proceedings of Human Factors Association of Canada Conference. Vancouver. Canada. 141-147.

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Comparisons
 Subjects role play different scenarios – natural
conversations
 Face to Face
 Office landline
 PC task (driving simulator) and landline
 Driver to Passenger (real traffic)
 Carphone to Base (real traffic)

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Efficiency (Chapanis 1972)
- Number of messages generated
- Number of words per message
- % phrases that were questions
- Total number of words used
- Communication rate
- Number of overlapping messages
- Number of pauses
- Number of confirmation questions

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Expert rating of outcome of negotiation
- Definite conclusion
- Justified deferral - action
experimenter
- As above - action subject
- Inappropriate conclusion
- Failure to complete

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Expert Participant
Efficiency Outcome Difficulty
Condition Score Rating Ranking
PC task 1 3= 3
Office landline 2 2 1
Face to Face 5 1 2
Driver Passenger 4 3= 4
Carphone 3 5 5
Outcome and Usefulness Scores for Conversations in
each Condition

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Study 2: Real road analysis of differences
between carphone and passenger initiated
mental tests
 Carphone performance worse
- Verbal memory decreased 25%
- Numerical memory decreased 21%
- Interpretation decreased 21%
- Speed decreased (particularly at early stage of conversation)
- NB same drive but carphone more difficult
- Parkes AM 1991 Contemporary Ergonomics 427-432

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Study 3: Hand held versus hands free
in driving simulator
Direct Line Insurance (2002) study
- 20 participants
- Alcohol 80mg
- Hand-held
- Hands-free
- Route: high fidelity driving simulator, car following,
in traffic, curves, urban
Burns, P.C., Parkes, A.M., Burton, S., Smith, R.K., And Burch, D. (2002). How dangerous is
driving with a mobile phone? Benchmarking the impairment to alcohol. TRL Report TRL547.
Crowthorne: Transport Research Laboratory.

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Measures:
-distance keeping
-lane keeping
-reaction times to emergency events.
-choice reaction times to signs
-mental effort

42. Page  42 AlcoholHands-freeHand-heldControl
MentalEffort(+/-1StandardError)
140
120
100
80
60
40
20

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AlcoholHands-freeHand-heldControl
ReactionTime(s)
2.0
1.8
1.6
1.4
1.2
1.0
.8
.6
.4
.2
0.0
0.98 s0.98 s
1.45 s1.45 s
1.25 s1.25 s
1.11 s1.11 s
Reaction Times to Warning Signs

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RT results
At 70mph, vs. control condition:
- Alcohol: ~1 car length
- Handsfree: ~3 car lengths
- Handheld: ~3+ car lengths
The difference between:
- Accident vs. No accident
- Injury accident vs. Fatal accident

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Study 4: Situation Awareness
3 levels
- target prediction
- target recognition
- target perception
translates into 3 probe questions about
following traffic
Parkes, A.M. And Hooijmeijer, V. (2001). Driver situation awareness and carphone use.
1st. Human-Centered Transportation Simulation Conference. University of Iowa, Iowa
City USA, November 4-7 2001

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Situation awareness
15 subjects
Static medium fidelity simulator
Two lane carriageway, moderate traffic
Simple standardised conversations
Behavioural measures at speed transitions
(60-40)
Shut down method for SA (x2)

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0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
-500 -400 -300 -200 -100 0 100 200 300 400 500
Distance from speed limit sign
(in n metres)
Speed(km/h)
no conversation
conversation

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Situation awareness 1
No. of correct
answers;
Location 1
Without
phone
conversation
With phone
conversation
χ2
Critical value p-value
Question 1 14 4 13.89 12.12 <0.0005
Question 2 14 6 9.60 9.14 <0.0025
Question 3 13 6 7.03 6.63 <0.0100

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Situation awareness 2
No. of correct
answers;
Location 2
Without
phone
conversation
With phone
conversation
χ2
Critical value p-value
Question 1 12 5 6.65 6.63 <0.01
Question 2 12 4 8.57 7.88 <0.005
Question 3 12 5 6.65 6.63 <0.01

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Conclusions
Hands free marginally better than hand held.
All carphone conversations result in:
- slower speed, more drifting in lane,
- slower reaction time, more missed events
- less situation awareness

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Transport Research Laboratory
The Effect Of Text Messaging On Driver
Behaviour
A Simulator Study
PPR 367
PUBLISHED PROJECT REPORT

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Speed while texting (simulated motorway driving)
72
74
76
78
80
82
84
86
88
90
Control Texting
Drive
Meanmaximumspeed(mph)

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Reaction times for 4 events during drive
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
1.2
1.4
1.6
1.8
2.0
2.2
2.4
2.6
Auditory 1 Auditory 2 Auditory 3 Visual
RT task
RT(sec)
Control
Texting

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Movement in lane position (SDLP) while reading
0.00
0.10
0.20
0.30
0.40
0.50
0.60
0.70
Control Texting
Drive
MeanSDLP

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Movement in lane position while texting
0.00
0.10
0.20
0.30
0.40
0.50
0.60
0.70
Control Texting
Drive
MeanSDLP

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Lane departures
18 departures
(by 4/17 participants)
0 departures
(by 0/17 participants)
0
5
10
15
20
25
Control Texting
Drive
Totalnumberoflanedepartures

58. Other studies
Virginia Tech study
of real driving
200 vehicles; 3
million miles;
4,452 critical
events
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 81% of events involved driver distraction
 23× increased risk of event involvement when texting
 Eyes off road for four of every six seconds

59. Dangers of texting whilst driving…
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AP Photo

60. Dangers of texting whilst driving…
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61. Highway Code – England, Scotland and Wales
 148
 Safe driving and riding needs concentration. Avoid
distractions when driving or riding such as
 loud music (this may mask other sounds)
 trying to read maps
 inserting a cassette or CD or tuning a radio
 arguing with your passengers or other road users
 eating and drinking
 smoking
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62. Page  62
149
You MUST exercise proper control of your vehicle at all times.
You MUST NOT use a hand-held mobile phone, or similar
device, when driving or when supervising a learner driver,
except to call 999 or 112 in a genuine emergency when it is
unsafe or impractical to stop. Never use a hand-held
microphone when driving. Using hands-free equipment is also
likely to distract your attention from the road. It is far safer
not to use any telephone while you are driving or riding - find
a safe place to stop first or use the voicemail facility and listen
to messages later.
Laws RTA 1988 sects 2 & 3 & CUR regs 104 & 110
Highway Code

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Highway Code
 150
 There is a danger of driver distraction being caused by in-vehicle
systems such as satellite navigation systems, congestion
warning systems, PCs, multi-media, etc. You MUST exercise
proper control of your vehicle at all times. Do not rely on driver
assistance systems such as cruise control or lane departure
warnings. They are available to assist but you should not reduce
your concentration levels. Do not be distracted by maps or
screen-based information (such as navigation or vehicle
management systems) while driving or riding. If necessary find
a safe place to stop.
 [Laws RTA 1988 sects 2 & 3 & CUR reg 104]

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Liability for employers
 Salomon Smith Barney stockbroker (1999)
 Driving to non-business event
 Struck and killed 24 year old motorcyclist
 On personal time but admitted making ‘cold calls’ to
clients using his own mobile phone
 Company settled out of court for $0.5m
 Recognised it could be seen to be permitting/expecting
employees to make cold calls when driving
 Avoided potentially larger pay out

65. Liability for employers
Page  65
 Ford v. McGrogan & International Paper (2008)
 Employee of International Paper crashed into another
car while distracted by use of a mobile phone
 Victim of the crash lost an arm
 Sued International Paper resulting in $5.2 million
settlement

66. So what can employers do?
Having a policy is not
sufficient
Must be seen to be
doing all that is
reasonably practicable
to implement and
reinforce the policy
Page  66

67. Page  67
The future
 Possible approaches to reduce effect
1. Legislation on drivers
2. Legislation on manufacturers
3. Improved secondary safety systems
4. Technology
5.Social pressure

68. More great ideas?
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Thank
you for
your
attention