14 January,2011 04:18 PM IST | | Agencies
A new research has suggested that using mobile phone while driving may not be as dangerous as it is believed.
Despite existing research stating that driving while using your mobile phone could be as dangerous as driving under the influence of alcohol, new research has found the link between mobile phone use and car crashes may have been overestimated.
A study by economists from the University of Chicago and the London School of Economics used data from a Californian mobile phone company and compared it to crash statistics over an 11 day period, and found that despite a rise in phone calls made on the move, no significant correlation was found.
The findings matched roving call data (by monitoring phones moving between phone towers) with crash reports at specific times when it could be proved that the number of drivers on the road using their phone increased, but over the research period there was no increase in reported crashes.
The researchers concluded that there are three possible explanations for the outcome:
-People who talk on their phone while driving may become more cautious of other road-users
-People who have no regard for other road-users will still drive the same whether they''re using a phone or not while mobiles may distract some, they may actually make other drivers more alert
"It simply implies that current cellular use by drivers does not appear to cause a rise in crashes," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted the report as saying.
"It is possible that drivers who use such devices compensate for the added distraction by driving more carefully," the report added.
