AAA Report Finds Hands-Free Tech In Cars Poses Risks

The American Automobile Association has published a report saying that voice recognition systems can often distract drivers, causing safety risks on the road.

Voice-activated systems in cars do everything from help drivers navigate to change radio stations. Nick Jarmusz from AAA Wisconsin said that 3 out of 4 drivers in the nation believe such hands-free technology is safe to use. As it turns out, that may not be the case.

“There’s a strong misconception out there that as long as your hands are on the wheel and your eyes are on the road, somehow you are safe,” said Jarmusz.

Jarmusz brought up a study done by the University of Utah that challenges that idea.

“Of the three kinds of distractions that drivers can engage in — the physical distraction, the visual distraction or a mental distraction — the mental distraction is actually most dangerous of the three,” he said.

The study also found that a real voice was no less distracting than artificially created one, and that a system’s ability to comprehend what a driver wants affects distraction levels. In other words, there was more driver distraction with systems that made mistakes or that asked for questions to be repeated.