A recent survey of 2,000 U.S. adults shows that a third find texting while driving acceptable while nine out of 10 respondents said they would speak up if they saw a driver texting.

The online survey was commissioned by Erie Insurance and released as part of Distracted Driving Awareness Month in April.

Twenty-seven percent said they find texting while driving acceptable and 73% unacceptable. Thirty-seven percent said they don’t feel it’s their place to tell a driver what to do, while one in five, or 21%, said they don’t say anything because they text while driving, too.

The top five reasons passengers wouldn’t tell a driver to stop texting include:

• • I don’t feel it’s my place to tell the driver what to do: 37%
  • I wouldn’t want to start an argument: 33%
  • It would be uncomfortable saying something: 32%
  • I do it, too: 21%
  • It doesn’t bother me when someone texts while driving: 21%
  • I wouldn’t want to offend the driver: 13%

One in five American drivers, or 20%, said they’ve been told by a passenger to stop texting while they were driving. Of those, 10% kept doing it anyway. Forty-seven percent stopped but did it again later when the passenger wasn’t in the vehicle with them. Forty-three percent, however, stopped texting and never did it again.

“We were encouraged to see that passengers can make a difference in getting drivers to change their behavior,” said Bob Buckel, Erie Insurance vice president and product manager. “The more people speak up about unsafe distracted driving behaviors like texting, the less people will do it and the safer roads will be for everyone.”

Buckel added in response to questions from RDN that Erie wanted to bring attention to texting while driving to protect their customers’ lives.

“We hope the survey will spark conversations about the dangers of distracted driving and provide tips to passengers to speak up if they’re in a vehicle with someone who is texting while driving,” he said. “The overall goal is to make texting while driving socially unacceptable.”

Erie has conducted several distracted driving surveys before, including man-on-the-street interviews about vlogging while driving. And University of South Florida psychology professor Paul Atchley said research shows hands-free isn’t safe.

“It’s your brain that’s the problem, not touching a phone,” he said. “And we know when your brain is engaged by a phone call — even a hands-free one — the risk for a car crash increases.”

There are no specific laws against talking to a camera mounted on a dashboard while driving, but 24 states and Washington, D.C. prohibit using hand-held cell phones while driving and 36 states and Washington, D.C. ban all cell phone use by novice or teen drivers, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). Visit the Governors Highway Safety Association to learn about the laws in each state.

Another psychology professor, Stanislaw Kolek, told Erie passengers that are uncomfortable with their driver texting but don’t know what to say to get them to stop could suggest driving for them while they text.

“It’s a way to get them to realize that the behavior is not wanted and that you’ve already come up with a solution. Asking them if you can be the driver in that situation is usually a very non-antagonistic way of getting yourself out of a dangerous situation.”

Eighty-seven percent of respondents said they think passengers should tell drivers to stop texting because the problem will only be solved when it becomes socially unacceptable, while 9% said passengers should not speak up because it should be up to the driver to decide for themselves whether to text while driving. Three percent said passengers should not tell drivers to stop texting while driving because there’s nothing wrong with it.

Buckel said drivers can avoid distracted driving by:

• • Putting your phone in safe driving mode, turn off notifications and set up GPS prior to heading out for turn-by-turn directions;
  • Listening to a radio show or a podcast to help keep you alert and your mind will automatically tune it out when it needs to;
  • Carpooling with another experienced driver to share driving duties and have a second set of eyes that can spot things you might otherwise miss;
  • Play verbal road games such as “I Spy: to keep your mind focused on the road and defensive driving.

Avoiding distracted driving could also save you money.

“We consider all moving violations in our premium calculations, including violations such as reckless driving, improper driving, and speeding, among others,” Buckel said. “And as state violations specific to distracted driving continue to evolve, we are regularly reviewing violation types to determine which ones are evidence of distracted driving and will update our rating for these violations as data suggests. We use our YourTurn Rewards program to incentivize safe driving behaviors. In order to score high enough in our YourTurn program to earn rewards, drivers need to make sure they are not using their phones while the vehicle is in motion.”

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, about 3,000 people are killed in distracted driving crashes every year.

Zutobi, an online driver education resource, crunched the latest data released by the NHTSA to find out the major causes of distracted driving, in which states distracted driving results in the most fatal road accidents, and how to avoid it.