14 DAY TRIAL // New scientific study revealed that talking over the cell phone while driving a car was far more distracting for drivers than discussing something with a passenger inside the vehicle. The research, to be published in American Psychological Association's December issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, showed that even hands-free communication devices influence the way drivers look at the situations that may occur on the road.
Behavior experts at the University of Utah used traffic simulators to come to these conclusions, as performing a real-life test would have been irresponsible. The computer models were designed in such a manner, that they would mimic the same scenarios that appear on any road, including other cars changing lanes and speeds, traffic signals and intersections. The participants were split into 2 groups, 41 people-large each, and pairs were randomly selected.
The researchers presented the test subjects with three scenarios: one in which there was no conversation in the "car," the second where the driver and the passenger discussed over the phone, and the third, where the two talked inside the car.
Analysis of their behavior revealed that driving while talking over the cell phone reduced driving performances significantly, as a large portion of the driver's attention was required, in order to listen to what the other person was saying. When both conversation partners were inside the car, the passengers also took an active interest in driving, by helping the drivers asses traffic situations and urging them to be careful.
Frank Drews, PhD, who was in charge of the current study, says that even the complexity of the speech in the test "drivers" changed according to the means of communication they employed, in that those talking over the phone used more complex speech, so as to limit the time the other person would actually speak. Drews hypothesizes that this is a "defense" mechanism, aimed at reducing the amount of attention the brain has to employ, in order to listen and understand what the other person is saying.