Parenting & distracted driving

We live in a busy world where we use our smartphone to answer emails, calls, and instant messages at all day long: using the phone in business meetings, at lunches, waiting for the bus, shopping or other event even at family gathering for sharing moments.

Sometime parents in local parks push the swing with one hand and use the other to scroll through their phones, and little time to smile back to the kid.

In modern era, let's say in digital world now, parenting became even harder. Excessive use of cellphones, it is getting more distracting. While driving is a must in the US but there are accidents involve with cellphone use, and the distracted driving seen as “a potential underlying cause” of traffic fatalities.

Most Americans think you should not ever use a phone while driving, but honestly most of us engage is some type of unsafe driving behavior, now it is getting worse with texting and increasingly taking video, using social media, or even write email while driving.

Electronic distraction behind the wheel are on the rise. In fact, a study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration on device use by drivers concluded there was a 336 percent increase in texting or typing on cell phones among all drivers from 2009 to 2014.

According to a new study indicates that cellphone use while driving remains a problem for parents across generational lines. Parents whether they are whether they are millennials or older — use their phones while driving. Two-thirds of parents said they use their phones less when their kids are in the car, and more than half said they are safer drivers in general if their children are passengers.

The rise of apps with features for selfies, videos, timeline updates, Likes, comments, and sharing are becoming more prevalent in the news because of accidents that occur when they are used. The proven inability for many drivers to refrain from social media while driving is creating a compelling need for help. Experts agree looking down at your phone for five seconds while going 55 mph is the same as driving the length of a football field without looking.

Cellphones may give us great discretion over when and where to work and how to stay connected with others, but rapid connectivity and use of cellphone extends the risk of distraction and ability to detach.

There are ways to avoid being distracted driver/parent, I think kids could help break parents of the habit of using their phones in the car by reminding them to drive safely, and other prevention tools include phone-locking apps like CellControl which provides a solution to distracted driving to teens and parent control for young drivers.