As technology has advanced, social media has become a much more common form of addiction for people today. Along with the development of this issue, the dangers and risks that come along with this addiction have increased. One of the greatest dangers being texting and driving has increased significantly in the past years.
As social media grows, adding more apps and features, checking phones and replying to text messages becomes more and more of immediate concern for people of all ages, rather than the concern of getting involved in a car accident.
While texting and driving does remain an issue among people of all ages, teenagers are still in the lead for the most distraction based accidents. This reality is supported by the Center for Disease Control, finding that teen drivers were more likely to be distracted than drivers over the age of 20. The urgency of this issue is much worse than it appears to be on the surface of news and social media. Awareness of the dangers of texting and driving needs to be spread to help stop this issue. Before a solution can be made for any problem, it is crucial to look into why the problem is occurring in the first place.
As we look into the roots of texting and driving and why teenagers feel checking their phone while driving is such an urgent matter, it can be discovered that this all stems from teenagers’ addiction to their phones. Junior at OHS Lauren Labelle, gives her thoughts on some of the biggest reasons teenagers may be on their phones while driving.
“I think changing music is definitely a big reason why people would be on their phones, and then also I think snap chatting is a big one too because Snapchat is super popular and I know a lot of people who like to send snaps while driving,” Labelle said.
Along with snap chatting and switching a song, one of the most significant reasons behind this problem happens to relate to teenagers not understanding just how dangerous this is.
As technology addiction spreads and grows more significant, the urgency to have awareness of distraction-related car accidents has decreased. However, this needs to be brought back to the attention of all current and future drivers. It is just as important to inform soon-to-be drivers as it is to inform current drivers, as they have no experience with cars and need to be aware of the risks.
According to the Federal Communications Commission, new drivers need to be educated that they should not use cell phones while driving and that looking away from the road even for a few seconds can lead to an accident. Along with this, junior at OHS Luca Larson, gives her take on the rate that the dangers of texting and driving are being made aware.
“I think teenagers and students don’t really pay attention in [drivers ed], so I think maybe they could talk about it in school in a class and have it be a unit to make kids more aware”, junior Luca Larson of OHS said.
With driver’s ed being the only main source of education on the dangers of texting and driving, it is essential that we expand the sources in order to prevent further increases in the rate of distraction related car accidents. Taylor Covington, a content researcher for The Zebra, an auto insurance company, states that over 3,000 teens are involved in fatal car accidents each year. This is not okay and more precautions need to be added to prevent this.