There is no shortage of distractions inside cars these days, but one new study suggests that the biggest drain on a driver's attention might not be what you think. According to The Telegraph, the Monash University Accident Research Centre in Melbourne, Australia has shown that children – not telephones – are more likely to distract people while driving.
For three weeks, the study followed 12 families with children ranging in ages ranging from one to eight. Using four cameras inside of the vehicles, researchers determined that out of 92 trips, a driver was distracted 90 times. Surprisingly, cell phone usage accounted for only 1 percent of these distractions, but kids in the back seat were a distraction 12 percent of the time. It is important to note that Australia has laws outlawing the use of cell phones without a hands-free device.
To qualify as a distraction for the study, the driver must look away from the road for more than two seconds, and some child-related kid distractions that were noted include playing with the child, passing food or drinks and, most commonly, watching the kids in the rearview mirror. The scariest piece of info is that the average parent looked away from the road for more than three minutes total during a 16-minute drive.