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posted by cmn32480 on Saturday November 26 2016, @06:47PM   Printer-friendly
from the when-does-investigating-become-snooping dept.

Police officers are worried they lack the right powers and resources to properly investigate whether a mobile phone was being used by a driver at the time of a crash, a new study has found.

Four out of five collision investigators surveyed for the research indicated mobile phone involvement in non-fatal accidents was under-reported, with half agreeing the role of phones was even overlooked in fatal crashes.

Three quarters of British officers participating in the online poll undertaken by the University of the West of England (UWE Bristol) were unable to report the full proportion of road accidents in their force area linked with mobile phone use each year. A similar percentage of officers indicated that better mechanisms to quickly analyse and investigate phone usage would be most likely to improve data collection.

Original Study


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 2) by Appalbarry on Sunday November 27 2016, @08:03PM

    by Appalbarry (66) on Sunday November 27 2016, @08:03PM (#433742) Journal

    Almost nothing linked from that page could be considered more than opinion. The one actual "study" isn't about actual accident statistics, it's phone survey asking drivers about accidents.

    Overall, 6% of respondents reported having been in a crash in the past year; 7% were in a near-crash; and
    the majority (86%) reported no crash. Men have slightly more crash or near-crash incidences than women (15% versus 12%, respectively). Young drivers 18 to 20 have the highest incidence of crash or near-crash experience (23%) compared to all other age groups, and drivers 65 and older have the lowest (8%). Young drivers report almost twice as many crashes (17%) as the next highest group, those 21- to 24-year-olds (9%), and up to four times as many crashes as the other age groups (4%–6%).

    Most drivers in the survey had not been in a crash or near-crash, but of the 718 drivers who were (males 14.9%, females 12.4%), 6% report that they were using a phone at the time: 4% were talking, 1% were sending a text message or e-mail, and 1% were reading a text message or e-mail.

    So, of the 6% of drivers who self-report being in an accident, a subset of 6% report using a phone at the time.

    This report mostly just reinforces that young inexperienced drivers are more accident prone, not that there's specific causal link between cel phones in cars and increased accidents.

    "Cel phones could distract someone and lead to an accident" is NOT the same as "cel phones in a car cause accidents," or, more specific to the cop claims, "If we find a cel phone in a car, we can claim that it caused the accident."

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