Study Says Hands-Free Devices Not Helping With Distracted Driving

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (WJZ) -- Distracted driving. Hands-free technology in cars is hardly danger free.

Gigi Barnett reports a new study on the special devices yields some surprising results.

Sending or reading a hands-free text or touching the dash are distractions drivers thought they could do with ease.

"With the hands-free, I'm still watching the road," driver Ethan Becker said.

A new study by AAA discovered that after the hands-free task is done, a driver can still be distracted for seconds -- up to 27 seconds.

"Even though you're no longer engaged in that distracting sort of activity, your brain, your mind, you're still mentally distracted," Ragina Cooper Averella, spokeswoman for AAA, said.

Twenty-seven seconds -- that's a long time on the road. In fact, according to the study, if you drove that length of time at 25 miles per hour, you would have covered nearly three football fields.

"How many times when we're driving and you're not talking on the phone, you're not texting, but you're just driving, how often is your mind distracted once you get to point B, your destination? You don't even really remember what you passed," said Averella.

"When I look down to put the number in, to hit the number, then I'm definitely not looking at what I'm supposed to be doing," said driver Lynn Otten.

Otten has sworn off hands-free devices behind the wheel. A real life run-in made her put the phone down for good.

"I got a text a while back from a friend, and when I went to read the text I bumped a woman in front of me," she said.

Researchers studied more than 250 drivers in ten vehicles and found that the fault may not rest solely on them, but on the design of their hands-free system.

AAA says there's a two-part solution.

"We would suggest motorists use it on a very limited basis," said Averella, "And certainly looking at having developers develop technology that really doesn't require the mind to be any more engaged than say listening to an audio book."

Which keeps the eyes and mind on the road.

Researchers rated cars with hands-free systems that offer little distraction. They found that the Chevy Equinox has the best system and the Mazda 6 had the worst.