In West Virginia, numerous victims are injured in accidents that are caused by distracted drivers every year. People who drive while they are distracted by electronics, pets, eating or other people endanger the lives of others who are also traveling around them. It is important for people to understand the types of activities that they should avoid while they are driving so that they can minimize their risks of causing accidents.

Many people attempt to multitask while they are driving, but doing so is dangerous. There are three primary types of attention that distracting activities can take away from the road, including visual, cognitive and manual. Activities that are visually distracting take the drivers’ eyes away from the road. Those that are manually distracting take the drivers’ hands off of the wheel to do other things. Those that remove their cognitive attention from the road might include conversations with passengers or with others while talking on cell phones. Texting while driving is especially dangerous because it causes all three types of distraction simultaneously.

Texting is not the only activity that drivers should avoid. They should also not eat while they drive or adjust their stereo systems or GPS. If they have children traveling with them, they should pull over to help them rather than trying to take care of their needs while the vehicle is still in operation.

It can sometimes be difficult to prove that accidents were caused by distracted drivers. Experienced personal injury lawyers may be able to uncover evidence of distracted driving by completing thorough investigations of what the drivers were doing just prior to the accidents. Gathering this type of evidence may help them to build strong cases for their clients, assisting them with procuring a settlement from the at-fault motorist’s insurance company.