One of my dear friends met with an accident recently, over a useless news alert from the Operator. Having heard a text alert, he had let go of his brakes while reaching for his hand phone. Fortunately for him, his insurance covered the cost of his ruined bonnet and his silly mistake, but not the biggest mistake he committed by telling us the truth and becoming the butt end of our jokes.
A quick question for you: how many times have you met with an accident, while on the phone? If you are reading this, you survived it, if at all.
Here is a surprising observation. When we answer that ‘irresponsible’ call while driving, unlike my good friend, we tend to be more vigilant, even slowing down, to do so. However, accidents can occur as a result of what follows that call, especially if it happened to be your wife, yelling at you for not mowing the lawn. We will try to catch up for the loss of time incurred due to the call, taking more risks by speeding and overtaking, etc,. So, what is really dangerous is not the call itself, but how it alters our behavior after that.
Now, unfortunately, most communications tend to miss this fact and always depict the driver as being caught off guard while on the call. Because we instinctively know this to be rare and especially, since we compensate the call by lowering consumption of risk while on the call, we dismiss the claim and go on with our behavior, rendering that piece of communication ineffective. I believe that the proposition should revolve around, “it’s what happens after the call”, and not, “it’s what happens during the call”.
A quick question for you: how many times have you met with an accident, while on the phone? If you are reading this, you survived it, if at all.
Here is a surprising observation. When we answer that ‘irresponsible’ call while driving, unlike my good friend, we tend to be more vigilant, even slowing down, to do so. However, accidents can occur as a result of what follows that call, especially if it happened to be your wife, yelling at you for not mowing the lawn. We will try to catch up for the loss of time incurred due to the call, taking more risks by speeding and overtaking, etc,. So, what is really dangerous is not the call itself, but how it alters our behavior after that.
Now, unfortunately, most communications tend to miss this fact and always depict the driver as being caught off guard while on the call. Because we instinctively know this to be rare and especially, since we compensate the call by lowering consumption of risk while on the call, we dismiss the claim and go on with our behavior, rendering that piece of communication ineffective. I believe that the proposition should revolve around, “it’s what happens after the call”, and not, “it’s what happens during the call”.
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