Hands-Free Cell Phone Use Takes a Hit

A hands-free device doesn't make a cell phone any less distracting, according to a federal study.

WASHINGTON — Detailed new research shows that using a cell phone behind the wheel is a key cause of traffic accidents and that hand-free devices provide little safety benefit, federal officials told an international automotive safety gathering Wednesday.

In a closely watched real-world study published Wednesday, a team from the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration watched 100 drivers for a year, concluding that the use of electronic devices such as cell phones precipitated many crashes and near-misses.

Other NHTSA researchers said devices like head sets or voice-activated dialing led to longer dialing times than for those using hand-held phones. The delays offset the potential benefit of keeping both hands on the wheel.

In a nation of cell phone users, hands-free devices have been touted as a potential solution to growing driver distraction issues. New York banned drivers from using hand-held phones in 2001. New Jersey and the District of Columbia passed similar laws last year.

But whether drivers use a hand-held device or not, "phone use degraded both driving performance and vehicle control," said NHTSA's Elizabeth Mazzae.

The NHTSA-Virginia Tech team used cameras and internal car sensors to track the activities inside a vehicle immediately before a dangerous event, including crashes, near-crashes and "incidents" that required an evasive maneuver to avoid a crash.

The 100-car study showed such events and accidents were often preceded by distraction, and the most frequent distraction was the use of a cell phone or other electronic device.

There were nearly 700 incidents involving wireless devices, the study found.

The next most-frequent source of distraction was a passenger, which preceded a problem situation nearly 400 times. Eating — another common distraction — led to risky behavior just over 100 times.

The agency's research program is intended to test the assumption that hands-free phones are safe, NHTSA researcher Mazzae said during the International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles in Washington.

NHTSA officials have expressed concern that hands-free devices can give drivers a false sense of security, when research has shown that it is the act of conversation that leads to distraction and inattentive driver behavior.

Auto companies have been conducting their own research to gauge how well hands-free devices help drivers stay focused.

Jeff Greenberg, director of Ford Motor Co.'s driving simulator, has conducted a number of studies trying to break down which parts of cell phone conversations impair drivers. The research is building, but it is too soon to know what to do, he said.

"The preponderance of evidence suggests that long conversations while driving impair your ability to react to events," Greenberg said. "But it would be difficult to make rules about conversations in vehicles."

The federal research presented Wednesday adds to a growing body of studies that suggest hands-free cell-phone systems will not deliver the safety benefits automakers and legislators hoped for.

In 2003, for example, University of Utah professor David Strayer found cell-phone conversations can lead to a kind of "inattention blindness," as drivers fail to recognize objects or events in their field of view. Strayer found that drivers using hand-held and hands-free cell phones were equally impaired.

Drivers seem split on the issue. Some said their own experiences show that going hands-free can actually create additional problems for drivers.

"It's a distraction trying to keep the earpiece in your ear," said Benn Perry, 50, a Michigan resident who said he doesn't use the hands-free device his wife gave him.

Others aren't convinced of the dangers of cell phones.

Greg Rosinski is a Canton, Mich., resident who uses his cell's speaker phone function. He said studies about the dangers of cell phone use while driving tend to exaggerate.

"Having a baby or even another person in the car is just as distracting," said Rosinski, a former account representative for a cell phone company. "I don't buy any of this scare tactics stuff. Cell phones are no more a cause of accidents than someone applying mascara or eating in the car."