Texting and driving Essay Example for Free

Texting and driving Essay I think texting and driving is dangerous and whether or not it has affected you as of now, statistics show it could in the future. Did you know that texting while driving is now one of the most common distractions that take a driver’s eyes off the road today? Imagine if someone in your family, your mom, dad, or sibling were killed by a driver who was texting, how would you feel? Would you think, was that text really worth losing a life over? I am going to show you that texting while driving is never a good idea and can have dangerous and deadly consequences’ for that individual. Problem: Texting while driving kill’s people on a daily basis. Recent statistics from 2009 show that 5,474 people in the United States were killed due to texting. This was a significant increase from 2007 when 3,210 people were killed in accidents where drivers were texting.(http://www.stoptextsstopwrecks.org/#facts) Teenagers are the most experienced drivers and when they read or write a text it compounds their likely hood of having a fatal accident. Statistics bears this out with this age group when texting and driving 45% of their accidents resulted in death. The Allstate Foundation’s recent survey showed that 82% of teens report texting while driving, while only 23% admit to drinking and driving which shows how common this practice is for this age group. According to data collected by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety on (http://www.textndrive.com/, more teenagers die on May 20 than any other day of the year. Over the past five years, May 20 claimed 63% more lives than any average day because of prom and other end of the school year celebrations II. Cause: Driving and texting is considered a multi-tasked skill that increases the output of the driver’s brain causing distractions to our cognitive functions, memory, visual fields, and manually. The first way that texting interferes with drivers is through the brain’s cognitive functions that allow for multi-tasking. Driver’s attention span is split between what’s going on in the road and what’s happening on their cell phone, and this lack of focus makes them a liability for other drivers. Most people do not have the cognitive skills to manage two different multi-tasked processes at once.  This causes individuals brains to process too much mentally, making the information that is received unclear and hard for them to react quickly to events happening in their surroundings. Second way that texting interferes with driving is through memory. a. Memory is when the brain engages in a constant process that sends. III. Solution: There are many solutions to this problem and I will list a few: Unless you are on a long road trip, put your phone away until you arrive at your destination, if you have to text just pull over for a few minutes. There are apps for most phones that you can use to prevent if you are tempted to text while you are driving called anti-texting apps that can be utilized. If you are on a trip with more than yourself, designate a person that will be the texter, if you are driving have your passenger text for you so you can concentrate on the road. Silence your phone if you are one who has to look at your phone for every noise it makes. I have just taken you through the problems with texting and driving. Provided you with the statistics and presented you with possible dangers of texting and driving. I have given you alternatives to not only keep you safe but to also keep others safe too. Laws are being enacted due to the public outcry and most states are on board with legislation punishing drivers that text. But that would be a drop in the bucket should you be distracted and injure or kill someone when it could have been avoided. I hope that I have convinced you to join me in educating people to change their driving habits†¦ Silence can saves lives. References: BIBLIOGRAPHY \* MERGEFORMAT Stop the Texys Stop the Wrecks. (2014). From Stoptextsstopwrecks: www.stoptextstopwrecks.org www.stoptextstopwrecks.org. (2014). From www.stoptextstopwrecks.org www.textndrive.com. (2014). From www.textndrive.com: www.textndrive.com/wordpress/2010/05/may-20-is-deadliest-day-for-american-teen-drivers/ Here is the link to my Persuasive speech: http://youtu.be/dgCanjzytFs