The Screens in Cars are Becoming a Problem

upstart writes:

The Screens in Cars Are Becoming a Problem:

You're driving and you're bored. Tired of staring at the road, your eyes drift toward the polished touchscreen to the right of your steering wheel-what the auto industry calls your "infotainment" system. First you scroll through its menus to select a pump-me-up playlist; then you use its mapping tool to reroute toward a nearby Starbucks.

Sounds like a typical driving experience these days. Sure, you temporarily looked away from the road while tapping through the infotainment system, but that's no big deal. Right?

Well, it could be. You might have been distracted for as long as 40 seconds while changing your destination, according to an analysis by the AAA Foundation-long enough to cover half a mile at 50 mph. As for choosing playlists, one study found that drivers selecting music with Apple CarPlay or Android Auto had slower reaction times than those who were high from smoking pot.

"Today's infotainment systems can be as distracting-if not more so-than personal electronic devices," says Jennifer Homendy, the newly confirmed chair of the National Transportation Safety Board. The federal government blames distraction for around 10 percent of the 38,680 annual traffic fatalities in the United States, but that's almost certainly an underestimate, since people aren't inclined to admit they were fiddling with a phone or a navigation system prior to a crash.

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