Car Accidents, Smartphone Adoption and 3G Coverage

Authors

Jonathan Hersh, Chapman UniversityFollow
Bree J. Lang, University of California, RiversideFollow
Matthew Lang, University of California, RiversideFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2-24-2022

Abstract

This paper examines the relationship between smartphone use by drivers and traffic accidents in California between 2001 and 2013. In order to estimate smartphone use, we first show that widespread adoption of modern smartphones began in 2009 after the release of the iPhone 3G and T-Mobile G1. This information is combined with annual 3G coverage maps that are constructed from cellular tower information in a machine learning framework. In a difference-in-differences framework, we estimate the combined effect of smartphone adoption and 3G coverage along quarter-mile road segments. Controlling for census tract population density, road and year fixed effects, Poisson regression results show that there is a statistically significant increase in the traffic accident rate along a road segment when smartphone use becomes possible. Our preferred specification suggests smartphones caused accident rates to increase by 2.9 percent, resulting in 3500 additional accidents per year in California. Event study results rule out the possibility that our smartphone treatment is capturing a trend in the accident rate. The results are robust to a variety of specifications and consistent with individual-level studies showing that cell phone use leads to lower driving quality. The findings also provide guidance for policies aimed at reducing cell phone related accidents and distracted driving.

Comments

NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, volume 196, in 2022. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2022.01.033

The Creative Commons license below applies only to this version of the article.

Recommended Citation

Hersh, J., Lang, B. J., & Lang, M. (2022). Car accidents, smartphone adoption and 3G coverage. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 196, 278-293. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2022.01.033

Peer Reviewed

1

Copyright

Elsevier

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.