{"id":14582,"date":"2024-02-22T15:20:48","date_gmt":"2024-02-22T15:20:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/?p=14582"},"modified":"2024-02-22T15:20:48","modified_gmt":"2024-02-22T15:20:48","slug":"hands-free-phone-use-while-driving-as-dangerous-as-using-a-hand-held-mobile-study-highlights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/hands-free-phone-use-while-driving-as-dangerous-as-using-a-hand-held-mobile-study-highlights\/","title":{"rendered":"Hands-free phone use while driving as dangerous as using a hand-held mobile, study highlights"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The UK\u2019s roads policing lead and the CEO of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.roadsafetytrust.org.uk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Road Safety Trust<\/a> are supporting the findings of an Open University educational project highlighting that hands-free phone use while driving is no safe alternative to hand-held use.<\/p>\n<p>The project called \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.roadsafetyknowledgecentre.org.uk\/we-need-to-talk-about-handsfree-officer-understanding-of-the-dangers-of-handsfree-and-handheld-mobile-phone-use-by-drivers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">We need to talk about hands-free<\/a>\u201d, was aimed at police officers, who are at the frontline of dealing with the devastation that distracted driving can cause, to ensure they are fully informed.<\/p>\n<p>According to the Road Safety Trust, existing research shows drivers using either a hand-held or a hands-free phone are four times more likely to be involved in a collision.<\/p>\n<p>In the latest study, 470 officers from England and Wales took part in an interactive video task designed by researchers at the OU.<\/p>\n<p>Following the task, researchers said officer attitudes to the safety of legal hands-free mobile phone use by drivers dramatically changed, with 88 per cent reporting that, in future encounters with phone-using drivers, they would explain the dangers of all phone use, not just hand-held use.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEvidence shows that hands-free is as dangerous as physically using a mobile phone,\u201d said Ruth Purdie OBE, chief executive of The Road Safety Trust.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe cognitive distraction can increase crash risk, reduce hazard detection, and lead to poor situational awareness.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTherefore, it is vital, as this report highlights, that police officers are not recommending hands-free as a safe alternative to illegally using a hands-free device.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Chief Constable Jo Shiner, the National Police Chiefs\u2019 Council Lead for Roads Policing, said the work should be applauded and carefully considered by everyone who uses the roads.<\/p>\n<p>The research was funded by The Road Safety Trust and involved fellow academics from the Universities of Staffordshire and Keele.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The UK\u2019s roads policing lead and the CEO of The Road Safety Trust are supporting the findings of an Open University educational project highlighting that hands-free phone use while driving is no safe alternative to hand-held use. The project called \u201cWe need to talk about hands-free\u201d, was aimed at police officers, who are at the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":14583,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-global-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14582\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edriving.com\/three60\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}