Texting and driving is dangerous and one of the worst decisions you can make while behind the wheel—right up there with driving under the influence. Thousands of distracted drivers cause death and injury every year on US roads, and the truly sad part is that none of that had to happen!
We have the technology—and the common sense—to avoid texting and driving, so if you’re someone who drives with their phone in one hand, please read on.
Why Texting and Driving Is So Dangerous
I feel a little silly that I have to spell this out, but the safest way to drive is with your eyes on the road and both hands on the wheel. Anything that takes your eyes off the road and hands off the wheel increases the odds that you’ll get into an accident. This is why tactile controls in a car are so important, and touch screens are generally a bad idea.
At the speed that things can change, and given how slow the average human reaction speed is, looking away for just a few seconds can be lethal, and I’ve seen people texting without looking up for a long time.
Humans take a big dip in brainpower when switching tasks as well, which is one reason multitasking is a myth. You need time to process and refocus every time you switch, and all of this adds up to texting and driving being a very bad idea.
We’re also pretty good at convincing ourselves as individuals that we’re different. That we can do stuff other people can’t, or that you probably won’t get into an accident where someone else might.
Well, I’m telling you that no human being on this planet can text and drive without reducing their safety—but you don’t need to do it anyway!
Use Voice Assistants Instead
Whether you’ve got an iPhone or an Android device, you have access to a smart voice assistant that can both read text messages you’ve received and will take voice dictation to reply to those messages. This is true whether your phone is lying loose in the car, or connected to your car using Android Auto or Apple CarPlay.
Assuming your voice assistant is set up, you can trigger it with a phrase (e.g. Hey Siri) or in some cars there’s a button on the wheel that lets you activate the voice assistant to control apps on your phone. You’ll have to look up the details for your specific OS and phone model yourself, but once you’ve got it set up try it out with your car parked, but everything hooked up as if you were driving.
Enable “Do Not Disturb While Driving”
While it’s far safer to use voice commands while keeping your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road, talking to your phone is still some level of distraction. Similar to talking with another passenger in the vehicle. To avoid the temptation of replying to a text while driving, you can activate your phone’s “do not disturb” mode and prevent text notifications from coming through while you’re driving.
You can choose to do this manually every time you start a trip, or have it trigger automatically when certain things happen, such as connecting via Bluetooth to your vehicle, or activating an app like CarPlay. For example, on my iPhone under “Focus’ I can add a “Driving” focus which prevents notifications I choose to come through until my trip is finished.
Again, the exact details of how to set up “do not disturb while driving” depends on the OS and OS version of your specific phone, but in general you can set it up under a section of your settings called “Focus”, “Do Not Disturb”, or something similar.
Make It a Habit to Pull Over
If you simply can’t afford to wait to hear what a message says or you need to reply to it, and for some reason you can’t use the voice assistant, pull over as soon as it’s safe and legal to do so. Either the message is important enough to justify pulling over, or it can wait until your journey is over. There’s no middle-ground here.
Tell People You Won’t Text and Drive
A lot of the time, people text and drive not because they want to, but because they feel pressured. Perhaps it’s your boss or your spouse sending a message, and they expect an answer ASAP. It’s probably best if you clarify upfront that you won’t respond to texts while driving, so that they’ll know why you’re not getting back to them immediately.
If something really can’t wait, it should be a phone call, not a text message. In which case you can safely use the hands-free calling feature of your phone to take the call without putting yourself and other road users in danger.