If there was any doubt that cell phones distract drivers, one needs to look no further than a study by Carnegie Mellon University scientists that concludes that drivers engaged in cell phone use commit some of the same driving errors that can occur under the influence of alcohol.
The study examined 29 volunteers using a driving simulator while inside an MRI brain scanner. The researchers used state-of-the-art magnetic resonance imaging to measure activity in 20,000 brain locations, at intervals of a second. They found that cell phone listening reduces the amount of brain activity associated with driving by 37 percent. Based on the performance of subjects using a driving simulator, the level of distraction was sufficient to cause drivers to weave out of their lane.
Because driving and listening draw on two different brain networks, scientists had previously suspected that the networks could work independently on each task. But neuroscientist Marcel Just, director of Carnegie Mellon's Center for Cognitive Brain Imaging, said the study demonstrates that there is only so much that the brain can do at one time, no matter how different the two tasks are. "Drivers need to keep not only their hands on the wheel; they also have to keep their brains on the road," he said.
