A Call for Hands-Free Cell-Phone Use

Forgive Assemblyman Joe Simitian if he’s a little frustrated. For the past year, the Palo Alto Democrat has been championing legislation that would require California drivers to use hands-free devices when talking on cell phones, and wireless companies have managed twice to strangle his proposal in the Transportation Committee by a single vote.

Simitian is undaunted, however. He’s prepared yet another measure designed to discourage us 11 million cell phoners here from hurtling through space in a ton or two of steel with Nokias at our ears, distraction on our faces and only one paw on our steering wheels.

“I think it would pass off the Assembly floor, because it’s something that I think there is public support for,” Simitian says. “I don’t think we need a lot to tell us that if you’re holding a cell phone with one hand, you’re not really in control of your vehicle. The first thing they teach kids when they take driver training is, ‘Keep both hands on the wheel.’ ” Simitian fans his ardor with a sheaf of studies that support his point, most specifically a California Highway Patrol survey compiled during the first six months of last year. The survey implicated cell phone use in more collisions, 341, than any other so-called driver “inattention,” such as CD and radio use (316), child-related distractions (121) and eating (94).

It goes without saying that dialing a cell phone while driving is seriously distracting (since acquiring a cell phone six months ago, I’ve nearly rear-ended other cars a half dozen times while tapping out numbers). Whether the use of hands-free devices prevents accidents is a separate question, and still arguable.

At the University of Utah, a team of psychologists recently studied 48 undergraduates in controlled conditions. The students were put before computer screens, given joysticks and told to keep a cursor as closely aligned as possible with a smoothly moving target. Whenever the cursor flashed red, participants were to immediately press “brake” buttons on the top of the joysticks. While performing the task, half the subjects listened to the radio (and, later, books on tape), and the other half talked on cell phones with persons in another room. Half of the cell-phoners used hand-held devices, and half hands-free instruments.

Cell-phoners proved more than twice as likely to miss flashing red lights than the radio- and books-on-tape listeners. Also, they were slower in responding to the red lights they did see. More to the point, this was equally true for hand-held and hands-free phoners.

The researchers wanted to zero in on what aspect of cell-phone use most interfered with driving ability. Accordingly, they had the cell-phoners navigate two simulated driving courses, one easy and one difficult. Meanwhile, half were made to repeat words spoken to them over their cell phones, while the other half were given a “word generation” task, namely, to come up with words that began with the last letters of words spoken to them over the phones.

The researchers found that those tasked with word generation erred significantly more often in navigating the course, especially on the more difficult course. Thus, the study indicated, upholding one’s end of a conversation was more of a potential hazard than just listening to a co-conversant.

Cell-phone conversations apparently are more distracting than in-car conversations between automobile occupants. The researchers referred to earlier studies that indicated in-person chats tend to fall off when a driver encounters difficult driving conditions. “By contrast,” they write, “at least one of the participants in a cellular-phone conversation is unaware of the current driving conditions.”

The upshot of the study is that the real danger probably isn’t the number of hands a cell-phoner has on the wheel, but talking on a cell phone, period. Personally, I almost always use a hands-free device when cell-phoning in my car. Even so, I have to admit that, while I’m discussing details of a future trip with a friend, or trying to persuade my mother to move to a retirement home, my perception of minutes and miles melts away. I wonder what other perceptions do, too.

Joe Simitian doesn’t see such evidence as the Utah study as inimical to his legislative goal. “If people are going to be distracted by cell-phone conversations, even if they’re using a hands-free device, it’s even more important that they have both hands on the wheel,” he says. Legislation is no panacea for human incaution, but it does get our attention. Witness the seat belt law. Maybe a hands-free law will be a concrete first step toward getting drivers to reconsider cell-phoning itself. The next time I’m on a narrow, twisting canyon road and some monstrous SUV comes careening toward me with a one-handed driver clearly more interested in the cell phone clapped to his ear than the location of the center line, I know I’ll be earnestly wishing Simitian luck.