The majority of teen drivers crash after they get distracted.
Yet the most common distraction is not the cellphone, as one may assume, but attending to other people in the car, according to a study by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.
The study looked at more than 2,200 crashes recorded by interior dash cams. The researchers looked at the footage of drivers, aged 16 to 19, a few seconds before and after the crash.
Almost three out of five crashed after they got distracted.
Among them, one in four got distracted by attending to a passenger. One in five got distracted by a cellphone (usually not calling, but fiddling with the device).
Other common factors were unspecified distractions within and outside the car.
Overall, more than one in seven teen car crashes were preceded by the distraction of attending to a passenger and almost one in eight involved cellphone use.
