Food: A Driving Distraction?
According to a write-up on Insurance.com, 80 percent of auto accidents take place because of distractions. This information, they say, is from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, along with the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, who released a study the that states 87% of all rear-end crashes and 42% of near-crashes involve some form of driver distraction.
The study, however, does not specifically state eating or food as a distraction. Nonetheless, they feel strongly enough that such is the case that they made up a list of the top 10 “food offenders” – foods you should never eat whilst driving.
Those foods, along with their reasons are:
- Coffee (because you could hit a bump causing it to spill).
- Hot soup (same as coffee).
- Tacos (could leave your car “looking like a salad bar”)
- Chili Dogs (can drip down the front of your clothing)
- Hamburgers (grease, ketchup and mustard could end up on your hands and the steering wheel, causing you to need to wipe your hands or the wheel)
- Barbecued food – (same as hamburgers)
- Fried chicken – (same as hamburgers)
- Jelly donuts – (center can ooze out – again, causing a mess which causes a distraction)
- Soft drinks – (spills and carbonated fizz as you’re drinking can result in sudden movements)
- Chocolate – (chocolate coats the fingers as it melts; you try to clean it up and are likely to end up swerving)
I see an opportunity here to help with your diet, too. You could make one change by getting into the habit of avoiding food while driving. I think a lot of us eat mindlessly and out of habit behind the wheel. If munching on a particular food item while in the car becomes a habit, you tend to associate that drive along with the food, and a calorie-laden habit is born.
Since the study doesn’t specifically state food as a distraction – and since people have been eating behind the wheel since cars were invented, perhaps they’ve gone a tad on the over-paranoid side, in addition to not giving us mere human beings enough credit for knowing when to be careful. However, using our sensibilities, we know that being aware of potential problems is also a great way to avoid them. So it could behoove everyone to look the list over and keep in mind the potential for distraction when driving.
Avoiding an accident will keep your rates down, too. The average auto insurance rate increases 25% following a first accident. Plus, fast foods are the most commonly eaten food while driving, therefore you could also save a few dollars by avoiding that drive-through snack while on the road.
We just have to be careful not to allow this to become some over-the-top alarmist hype… or worse, an excuse for insurers to raise rates.
