NTL Record

Title National Survey of Distracted and Drowsy Driving Attitudes and Behavior: 2002: Volume 3: Methods
Record ID 13210
Personal Name
Creator
Royal, Dawn
Source http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/people/injury/drowsy_driving1/distracted03/VolumeIII03/DD%20Volume%20III%20032803/Default.htm
Corporate Creator Gallup Organization
Corporate
Contributor
United States. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Office of Research and Traffic Records
Publisher United States. Department of Transportation. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
Publication Date 20030300
Language English
Abstract This report represents the findings on distracted driving (including cell phone use) and drowsy driving. The data come from a pair of studies undertaken by National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to better understand drivers’ behaviors and attitudes regarding speeding, unsafe driving, distracted and drowsy driving. This report, Volume III: Methods Report describes the methods used to conduct the interviews and analyze the data, and also contains the questionnaires. Volume I: Findings National Survey of Distracted and Drowsy Driving reports respondent’s behaviors and attitudes on various topics related to distracted and drowsy driving. Volume II: Findings Speeding and Unsafe Driving presents the data on those topics. The data will be used to help identify the extent to which potentially distracting behaviors are undertaken by drivers and to understand the characteristics of those engaging in these behaviors so that programs can be developed to reduce these behaviors where they have been shown to be dangerous. The data come from two surveys each conducted among nationally representative samples of drivers during the Spring of 2002. Interviews were conducted with a total of 4,010 drivers in the U.S. The survey findings show that most drivers at least occasionally engage in behaviors that draw some of their attention away from their driving task. The most common of these behaviors include general activities of talking with other passengers (81%), changing radio stations or CDs (66%), and eating or drinking while driving (49%). While it is estimated that more than a billion driving trips are made weekly by drivers engaging in each of these behaviors, fewer than one in four drivers perceive these particular activities as distracting or as making driving much more dangerous. About one in four drivers uses a cell phone while driving for either inbound (26%) or outbound calls (25%), while a similar proportion deals with children in a back seat (24%). It is estimated that almost 800 million one-way vehicle trips are made each week while drivers engage in each of these behaviors (nearly 20% of all driving trips). Close to one-half of drivers perceive these behaviors to make driving much more dangerous, although drivers who use cell phones are only half as less likely as non-users to feel cell phone use is dangerous (about four in ten users do as compared to about eight in ten non-cell phone users). About one quarter (26%) of drivers have been involved in a crash in the past five years. About 3.5% of drivers attribute a crash they’ve had in the past 5 years to their being distracted (including 0.8% looking for something outside of their vehicle and 0.7% dealing with children), seven-tenths of 1 percent (0.7%) attribute a crash they’ve had to drowsy driving, while one-tenth of 1 percent (0.1%) of drivers attribute a crash they’ve had to their cell phone use. Projected nationally, these figures amount to an estimated 7.17 million drivers involved in a crash they attribute to distracted driving, about 1.35 million drivers in a crash attributed to drowsy driving and about 292,000 drivers in a crash attributed to cell phone use over the past 5 years.
Rosap ID dot:1049
Rosap URL https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/1049
TRT Terms Speeding; High risk drivers; Physiological fatigue; Distraction; Attitudes; Behavior; Surveys
General Subjects Drowsy and distracted driving
Classification NTL - SAFETY AND SECURITY - SAFETY AND SECURITY;
NTL - SAFETY AND SECURITY - Highway Safety;
NTL - SAFETY AND SECURITY - Human Factors;
NTL - PLANNING AND POLICY - Surveys
Geographical
Coverage
United States
TRIS Online
Accession No
941683
Contract Number 282-00-0017
Report Number DOT-HS-809-566
Availability NHTSA - Behavioral Safety Research
Resource type Research Paper
URL https://ntlrepository.blob.core.windows.net/lib/13000/13200/13210/4194-DandDVol3.pdf
Format PDF
Database NTL Digital Repository