Insufficient sleep among teenagers contributes to a rise in drowsy driving incidents, with one in six teens driving drowsy, a new study finds.
Summary: A new study by the National Sleep Foundation, presented at the SLEEP 2024 annual meeting, found that drowsy driving is a common threat among US teenagers, with approximately one in six adolescent drivers reporting they have driven while drowsy. The study projects that 1.7 million teenage drivers have driven drowsy, and over 400,000 teens drive drowsy at least once per week, largely due to work or school schedules. Despite recognizing the risks, teens perceive drowsy driving as less dangerous compared to drunk or distracted driving, highlighting the need for better education and prevention measures.
Key Takeaways:
- Approximately one in six teenage drivers reported driving drowsy, with over 400,000 teens driving drowsy at least once per week.
- Work and school schedules were major factors preventing teens from getting adequate sleep, with employed teens more than twice as likely to drive drowsy.
- Despite acknowledging the risks, teens view drowsy driving as less dangerous than other impaired driving, indicating a need for improved education and preventive measures.
A new study found that drowsy driving by teenagers is a common threat to public safety on U.S. roadways.
Results of the National Sleep Foundation study, presented at the SLEEP 2024 annual meeting, show that approximately one in six adolescent drivers reported having driven drowsy. Based on these responses, the authors project that 1.7 million teenage drivers have driven drowsy, and more than 400,000 teens drive drowsy at least once per week.
Risk Factors and Contributing Elements
The majority of teens pointed to work or school schedules as factors preventing them from getting the sleep they need to drive alert, and teen drivers with jobs were more than twice as likely to have driven drowsy than teens without jobs.
“This is a troubling rate, especially given that teens are new drivers with relatively low opportunity to have engaged in drowsy driving when compared to the lifetime of driving opportunities in adults,” says principal investigator Joseph Dzierzewski, PhD, the vice president of research and scientific affairs at the National Sleep Foundation in Washington, DC, in a release.
Additional findings reveal that when asked about the risks associated with drowsy driving, 95% of teens said drowsy driving is extremely or very risky. However, when asked about the likelihood of drunk, drugged, distracted, and drowsy driving leading to death or serious injury, drowsy driving was seen as having the lowest risk of death or serious harm.
Efforts for Drowsy Driving Prevention
Formally, the National Sleep Foundation developed and has produced Drowsy Driving Prevention Week since 2007 and recently published a new drowsy driving position statement.
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine identifies drowsy driving as a pervasive threat to public health and recommends that states mandate instruction in drowsy driving education as a requirement for driver’s education programs, provide comprehensive information about drowsy driving in state curricula and driver’s manuals, and include questions related to drowsy driving on driver’s license exams.
Additionally, the AASM encourages every driver to take responsibility for staying “Awake at the Wheel” by making it a daily priority to get sufficient sleep, refusing to drive when sleep-deprived, recognizing the signs of drowsiness, and pulling off the road to a safe location when sleepy.
Study Methodology
The study involved a nationally representative, probability-based survey of 1,124 US participants aged 13 to 17 years to assess drowsy driving prevalence, frequency, and beliefs.
Survey respondents reported whether they have ever driven while so tired they had a hard time keeping their eyes open, how often they did so, what kept them from getting the sleep needed to drive alert, and the perceived risks associated with drowsy driving.
Importance of Addressing Drowsy Driving
With motor vehicle crashes being a leading cause of death among US teenagers, researchers say this research sheds light on the increased attention needed for this preventable public health concern.
“Drowsy driving represents an immediate, and potentially tragic, consequence of poor sleep health, residing at the literal intersection of sleep health and public safety,” Dzierzewski says in a release.
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