Among the countless ways that smartphones impacted humanity is this sobering fact: Cell phone use leads to 1.6 million crashes a year, according to the National Safety Council (NSC). And roughly 25% of auto accidents in the U.S. now are caused by texting and driving. "Driving and cell phone conversations both require a great deal of thought," the NSC says. "When doing them at the same time, your brain is unable to do either well." Texting, talking or app use while behind the wheel loom large among the distractions that now pose serious peril to today's drivers. Distracted driving claimed 3,142 lives in 2020, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Other dominant driving distractions include eating, grooming and passenger conversations. A blog writer at Zutobi, the online driver's education resource, recently fused several government reports on distracted driving to determine the U.S. states where this bad driver behavior poses the greatest risk. By looking at the number of distracted driving fatalities paired with the overall number of traffic-accident fatalities in a year, Zutobi arrived at its lists of states with the most and least distracted-driving deaths. The slideshow above illustrates the 10 states that reported the highest percentage of distracted-driving fatalities, based on research by Zutobi and the NHTSA. See also: |
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Elana Ashanti Jefferson
Elana Ashanti Jefferson serves as ALM's PropertyCasualty360 Group Chief Editor. She is a veteran journalist and communications professional. Reach her by sending an e-mail to [email protected].
