5 Myths About Safe Driving

Piling in for a holiday trip? Trade in old, misguided info for the new rules of the road.

- KATE ROCKWOOD

MYTH #1

Using a hands-free headset or voice-assisted tech prevents distracted driving. 

MYTHBUSTER Nope. Whether or not you hold them, cell phones make you want to look at and listen to them, says Ryan Pietzsch, program technical consultant for driver safety education and training at the National Safety Council. "Research shows that drivers using handheld and hands-free phones see only about 50% of all the information in their driving environment," he says. "This 'inattention blindness' can lead to drivers' missing stop signs and pedestrians." A Texas A&M Transportation Institute study found that using voice-to-text apps was no safer than texting 47 PM 5:47 PM 789% manually. Simply talking quadruples your risk of a crash, says Christine Yager, a project specialist with the Youth Transportation Safety Program's Teens in the Driver Seat. So park your phone while driving; if you must use it for directions, change settings to limit or block notifications and texts.

MYTH #2

Buckling up in the back seat is overly cautious.