New Toyota TeenDrive365 Resources Help Parents Become Better Drivers
Given its name, you’d be forgiven for being a tad confused by the title of this article. Toyota TeenDrive365 resources were initially developed to help teach newly qualified drivers safer habits on the road, both for their sakes and for the sakes of drivers around them. Now, the program is expanding to add new resources designed to help teach parents to become more responsible behind the wheel so that they can become positive driving role models for their children. [ Watch a video from the program below ]
These additional resources stem from research carried out by Toyota and the University of Michigan Transportation Institute (UMTRI), which discovered that parents are the number one influencer in determining how responsible their teens will become behind the wheel. These new Toyota TeenDrive365 resources encourage parents and teens to learn safe driving behavior together. Almost two years after the program began, more than 1 million people have visited the website, over 22,000 have taken Toyota’s safe driving pledge, and more than 10,000 drivers have attended TeenDrive365 events.
A snippet from “Parents Who Drive Bad Anonymous”
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“As a mother of a teenager, I often remind myself that the things I do behind the wheel go a long way in setting a powerful example,” Dr. Tina Sayer, who is Toyota’s Collaborative Safety Research Center principal engineer and teen safe driving expert, commented. “Experience and education certainly help your teen become a safe and more confident driver, but our research shows us that the biggest factor in how teens will drive is their parents.”
Some of the new resources available to both parents and teens include the following:
- A new online commercial entitled “Parents Who Drive Bad Anonymous”
- A video series called “Masters of the Wheel,” which stars professional race car drivers discussing parents’ roles in helping shape their teens into safe drivers
- A distracted driver simulator that uses Oculus Rift virtual reality to demonstrate how everyday distractions can affect your driving
- An online pledge designed for parents who want to become better drivers for their teens
The abovementioned resources (apart from the simulator, which will appear at various auto shows in the coming months) are available at Toyota TeenDrive365’s website, so check them out—both for your young driver, and for yourself. As for the video, you can watch that right here.
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