Western Transportation Institute to study drowsy and distracted teen driving

Researchers at WTI will study Montana’s driver’s education program and how it affects the way teenagers look at drowsy and distracted driving

BOZEMAN, Aug. 15, 2008 -- Over the next year, researchers at Montana State University's Western Transportation Institute will use state-of-the-art video cameras to help teenage drivers stay safe on the state's rural roads.

The new study will use automated in-car cameras to gauge the effect of Montana's drowsy and distracted driver's education modules on teen attitudes and behaviors behind the wheel.

"Distraction and fatigue are big issues with teen drivers," said Nic Ward, a professor of mechanical and industrial engineering and a researcher at the institute. "They're particularly bad for teen drivers in rural areas."

Nationally, teenagers are involved in four times more fatal car accidents than drivers aged 20 to 70, according to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration.

The risk for teens only increases on rural roads. According to the NHTSA, the fatality rate for teens driving in states with mostly rural roads, like Montana and Wyoming, is almost four times higher than for teens who on mostly urban roads.

"The more rural your state, the more of your teens are dying on the roads," he said.

Ward believes the higher number of teen deaths on rural roads stems from a combination of road design, distance from medical help and a culture of potentially distracting activities and unsafe behaviors, such as using cell phones and not using seat belts.

Ward and fellow Western Transportation Institute researcher Laura Stanley will begin preliminary work this fall. They expect to purchase 40 in-car cameras from the San Diego-based company Drive Cam and install them into student vehicles sometime next year.

Each DriveCam camera will be mounted near the rear-view mirror and actually contains two lenses, one pointing at the driver and another watching the road ahead. The cameras are always on, but save video only when triggered by the unit's g-force sensors, Ward said.

Once triggered, the camera saves several seconds of video recorded before and after the traffic incident. This gives researchers a look at the situation surrounding a traffic incident, whether it be a quick swerve or a collision.