Introduction
Have you ever been a wreck due to someone not paying attention because they are on the phone talking or talking to someone in their car? Drivers can become very distracted and that can cause a lot of issues. Throughout this discussion I will be summarizing an article that was written about a study on drivers who use hands free cell phones and how it affects their attention and reaction time to events around them. I will be describing the purpose of the study, methods, results, and real- world implications. I will also discuss how this article has related to certain things I have learned classes I have completed. I will also be describing how the research in the article is like, or different from other things I have learned in my courses.
Purpose and Method
This article was about multiple (3) experiments that researchers ran to determine how distracted drivers can be in certain circumstances. According to Ferlazzo (2008), the purpose of the first study was to determine if verbal exchange in the car or verbal exchange using phone headsets and verbal exchanges through the loudspeaker in the car. According to, Ferlazzo (2008), experiment 1’s method involved the use of a dozen, in good health, women. These women were all right hand dominant, underclassman, between the ages of 23- 30, with exceptional vision and hearing. These women also had legal drivers’ licenses and their own vehicles driven in different environments.
These participants were put in gearboxes and given either a right earphone or the option of a loudspeaker. Participants were asked about 120 questions about everyday life as the researchers observed their attention and actions. While conversations took place, lights were used that would be seen to gauges the visual attention of the driver. The researchers also included environmental noises as another possible thing that could take away attention. Experiment 2 had to change a little due to the results no showing enough of a difference.
In the second Experiment they kept the phone and conversation methods the same. There was an addition of a travel environment change to communal areas with more traffic and stops. In the third experiment quiet, a few things changed. The researchers changed the communication methods to an earphone, external speaker, and handheld phone, with the addition of a computer driving simulator because the region the experiment was completed in abolished the use of cell phones while driving.
Most Important Results and Real-World Implications
The most important results in this experiment were that of the participants were more delayed in response to observable conditions while using the handheld and earphone cell phones than they were when talking to another individual in the car. The real-world implications from the study would suggest that the hazards of driving distracted by phones or talking to a passenger may not be the only issue. The study seems to imply that the way the driver directs their attention to certain distractions effects the outcome more than anything. The type of response would be a factor in safety. Though, it is safer to not direct your attention to anything else but the road and cars around you.
How Does This Research Relate to Research Design?
This research study relates to the current Research Design class I am finishing. The way the study was conducted and how it was put together relates to my learning of research study construction. This study went from the first step of a research study to the very last. In Research Design, we have learned to first come up with a hypothesis that we can test. In the first steps of constructing a research study, we would determine who the population we are testing, then we would run a series of tests, record the results, run tests again, record results again, and repeat if needed while making adjustments to see a change in results.
Article Construction
In research design we also learned how to construct an article that takes readers through every step of a study. This article perfectly displayed this example. Ferlazzo included an abstract, introduction, experiments 1- 3, and the experiments summary, method, participant information, instruments and stimuli, procedure, and results of each experiment along with the results. Ferlazzo also discussed the many confounding variables and the incorrect results, as well as the results that yielded no affect at all.
Conclusion
Driving distracted can cause so much harm to not only your vehicle and yourself, but the people and environment around you. It is important to take into consideration that when your full attention is on an electronic device or on a person it can have disastrous implications. Ferlazzo’s study was a repeated measures design in which he had to adjust remove confounding variables. Have you ever experienced a wreck due to someone’s delayed response from lack of attention?
