Deaf drivers and pagers

[jillio]

Okay so here is the thing with talking on the phone and driving. I have done it many times and did not come close to an accident. Hearing people talk to the other person in the car all the time and that doesn’t increase the accident rate necessarily. If talking to the person next to you did that there would be a 1000 times more accidents on the road then there are now. The thing though is some people get too involved in the conversation and do not pay attention to the road. I do not use my SK when driving I put my away message that I am driving. I cannot type, read what was said and drive correctly. With all those things going on I don’t think it is safe. It is safer to talk on the phone while driving since hearing people talk while driving. It is pretty safe to sign while driving because you have to look around you and use mirrors anyway so you can just make that as part of you looking around as part of safe driving, (although some one who is new to sign like myself this is difficult still). Some one who has both I would say using your pager while driving is more dangerous.

Yeah, but let me ask you this. If you are in an unfamiliar are, and looking for a specific address, and someone is in the car with you do you stop talking while you are concentrating on the address and the traffic? Past psych research says people do, because looking for the address and watching traffic are visual tasks, and listening to and responding to conversation is auditory verbal, and we cannot effectively split cognitive tasks. One thingor the other will suffer from too little attention. I know I can't concentrate on traffic look for an address, and carry on a conversation all at the same time without pausing.