For the Middle-Aged, Driving and Texting Really Don’t Mix
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Onzeg/iStock/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — The older generation ought not to throw stones at the younger generation when it comes to the potentially deadly mix of texting and driving if they’re tapping out messages on their phones.
Not only shouldn’t they be texting to begin with but people considered middle-aged are much more apt to get into a serious accident than virtually everyone younger who drives.
A study conducted at Wayne State University in Detroit put participants ages 18-59 through a driving simulator test in which they drove on a two-lane country road, sometimes at speeds of 50 to 60 mph while texting with one hand.
Beforehand, all the participants were asked about their texting skills, which ran from rudimentary to expert. After each person was tested for 30 minutes, co-study author Randall Commissaris said that about two-thirds either swerved into the other lane or drove on the shoulder while texting.
Even half the people ranked as expert texters committed lane excursions. But what was most interesting is that virtually every “driver” aged 45 to 59 drove into the oncoming lane while texting, regardless of their skills in contrast to a quarter of participants aged 18 to 24.
So what’s up with middle-aged drivers? Commissaris said the best guess by researchers is that they’re more prone to look at their phone while texting and just aren’t as proficient at multi-tasking as younger folks.
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