During the pandemic, distracted driving increased, and it hasn’t gone down since.

Until relatively recently, good data on the problem of distracted driving has been hard to find. The government estimates that 3,522 people died because of it in 2021, but experts say the official number probably majorly undercounts the number of deaths, in part because police are rarely able to definitively prove that a driver was distracted right before a crash.

In the last few years, though, the data on distracted driving has gotten better. Cambridge Mobile Telematics is a company that partners with major insurance companies to offer downloadable apps that drivers can use to save money on their rates. Via the apps, Cambridge Mobile Telematics (CMT) uses mobile phone sensors to measure driving behavior, including whether a person is speeding, holding their phone, or interacting with an unlocked screen while driving (the company says it doesn’t collect information on what the drivers are doing on their phones). Its work gives the company insight into the driving behaviors of more than 10 million people.

CMT recently analyzed driver behavior during millions of car trips. What it found should be troubling to anyone who uses a road in the US: During the pandemic, American drivers got even more distracted by their phones while driving. The amount of distracted driving hasn’t receded, even as life has mostly stabilized.

  • li10@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    18
    ·
    8 months ago

    Some people can’t leave their phones alone for five seconds.

    I was at the cinema the other day and this fucker sat on the front row and proceeded to keep going on their phone.

    I had to resist the strong urge to pelt a minstrel at his head.

    • Agrivar@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      8 months ago

      Why did you resist the urge? I would have stood up and walked over to his rude ass and confronted him. The rest of the crowd will almost certainly be on your side, even if they all lacked the courage to act.