'Distracted walking' endangers teenagers
Hey, kid: Hang up and walk!
A new study suggests "distracted walking" is taking a toll on teenagers as the number of pedestrian injuries soars among 16- to 19-year-olds even as it drops among nearly every other age group.
The findings, out today from Safe Kids Worldwide, a non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C., that pushes to prevent unintentional childhood injuries, found that the number of teens injured in pedestrian accidents rose 25% in the five-year period from 2006 to 2010, compared with 2001-05.
Using recent data on the growing prevalence of teen gadget usage, Safe Kids suggested the rise in teen injuries "is related to distraction, caused by the use of electronics and handheld devices while walking."
"We've got an emerging problem, and the emerging problem is what's going on with our teenagers," said Kate Carr, the group's president.
"We have distracted drivers who may be hitting pedestrians in the street, but we also have distracted pedestrians who are walking in front of cars."
Recent findings from the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project show cellphone ownership among young people grew sharply in the second half of the past decade. Pew found that teens send and receive an average of 110 text messages daily.
The good news: Pedestrian injury and death rates per 100,000 kids are declining across the board -- just not as quickly among teens. In 1995, according to federal highway safety data, pedestrian death rates for teens were slightly higher than those for children ages 5 to 9. By 2010, teen death rates were more than three times as high.
Researchers have already suggested a link between kids' cellphone use and pedestrian distraction: In a 2009 study in the journal Pediatrics, University of Alabama researchers put 77 kids age 10 to 11 through a street-crossing simulation. In half of the crossings, they asked kids to talk on a cellphone.
When distracted by conversations, kids were less attentive to traffic and left less "safe time" between their crossing and the next vehicle. They walked into more collisions and had more close calls with oncoming traffic.
Contributing: The Courier-Journal in Louisville
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