Eng 105 Assignment: Using Phone While Driving Is A Distraction Or Not

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Using phone while driving is a distraction or not
The use of technology products such as mobile phones and cars has gained popularity over recent times. Particularly, smartphones have become addictive such that their users do not want to put them away when performing tasks including driving. On its own, driving is a task that requires maximum concentration of the driver to ensure safety. However, drivers are increasingly ignoring this requirement by engaging in either texting or making and receiving calls when driving. This is attributed to the need of responding to emergency calls, saving time while communicating and avoiding boredom while driving. Additionally, most of the people who engage in phoning while driving have arrived at their destination without any harm. Although this can be safe to some extent, it does not guarantee 100% safety of the persons involved. This is evidenced by the increased car crashes that have recently occurred over the same. Using the phone while driving divides the attention of the drivers and distracts them from achieving high performance while driving. It also lowers their ability to make a proper judgment while driving and could result in accidents that could have otherwise been avoided. As such, the use of phoning and driving are tasks which should not be encouraged since they will overlap the mind of their user. Accordingly, this paper proves that the use of phones while driving is a distraction.
Driving in itself is an activity which requires maximum concentration from an individual. However, there are situations where the driver is required to give about 60% concentration on driving. These cases involve driving on roads which are not busy and driving at night on roads which the user is very familiar with. With such clear roads, an individual may not be required to focus on the road fully. As such, they may be required to engage in other activities that would keep them busy and protect them from activities associated with boredom such as sleep (Walsh et al. 6). Moreover, the ability to perform many tasks at ago enables an individual to perform both primary and secondary tasks at the same time. This implies that an individual may drive as well as use their phone at the same time. Such situations prove that phoning while driving is not a distraction as it would not have any impact on the performance of either task. This belief has been evidenced by research which proves that most people have arrived at their destinations safely despite using phones (Mello & Shane, 22). Consequently, driving can be done alongside any other task such as texting and receiving calls without the driver being necessarily distracted.
On the other hand, there has been recent evidence of distracted driving attributed to the use of phones. According to the National Centre for Statistic and Analysis, about six people are killed on a daily basis and 1000 others injured due to phoning while driving. Such a situation would have been avoided if the victim, particularly the driver, restrained from using their phones while driving. Using mobile phones while driving increases one’s chances of being involved in a crash because their attenti...