Iowa survey shows concern for unbuckled teen passengers

A new motor vehicle safety study from the University of Iowa shows that nearly 25 percent of young Iowa teens remain unrestrained in cars, something researchers consider "alarming."

According to a news release from the College of Public Health, to monitor child passenger law, researchers spent three months observing 3,000 youth in 36 Iowa counties, and found that the 24.8 percent of unbuckled older youth (between ages 14 and 17) are violating the state's child passenger safety law, which says backseat passengers under 18 must wear seat belts.

John Lundell, deputy director of the UI Injury Prevention Research Center, said the upper age requirement in the back seat changed just two years ago, from 10 to 17, "So perhaps there is some resistance or ignorance about (it)," he said.

"Compared to infants in safety seats, parents are somewhat more lax with enforcing restraint usage in older kids," Lundell said. "Then as the kids reach the teen years I do believe it is increasing defiance, feeling of invincibility, and it being 'not cool,'" he added.

Despite the concern with teenage passengers, researchers found some positive points and improvements with infant and toddler vehicle occupants.

The study shows 97.9 percent of children less than 12 months old are properly being secured in a car seat, and only 6 percent of toddlers (ages 1 through 5) were found to be restrained solely by a seat belt (not a car or booster seat, which is required by law) - down 7 percent from the toddler age group two years ago.

It was also noted 78 percent of underage passengers occupy the back seat, the safest location during a crash, Lundell said in the report.

Lundell said with the ample data that has now been collected, he intends to analyze the impact of teen passenger restraint with a 16 or 17-year-old driver against that of an adult driver.

"I have a pretty strong hunch that teens with teen drivers will have significantly lower belt usage," he said.

Regardless, Lundell encourages passengers of all ages to use safety restraints.

"If the driver isn't belted there is a higher probability the passenger won't be either, and vice-versa," he said.

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