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Study Finds One in Four Parents Have Left Children Unsecured in Vehicles

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Child Safety

The results of the recent Safe Kids Worldwide survey funded by part of a $2 million General Motors Foundation grant have found that one in four parents and caregivers have at one point or another failed to safely secure their children in vehicles.

The national online survey polled 1,002 parents and caregivers of children aged 10 or younger in an effort to observe automotive safety standards and practices.  The results revealed that 25-percent of those sampled admitted to having driven without buckling their child into their booster seat or car seat.


RELATED: Safety Tips for Teenage Drivers


The results of the study, which is entitled “Buckle Up: Every Ride, Every Time,” are broken down and analyzed by Jen Pollakusky of SafeKids.org.  Some interesting findings include twenty-one percent of parents finding it acceptable to drive with an unrestrained child if the length of the trip is considered short (despite the fact that around 60 percent of crashes that involve children occur 10 minutes or less away from the homestead) and that better educated and more affluent parents are in some cases twice as likely to deem not buckling their children up as acceptable behavior.

The release of the results coincides with Child Passenger Safety week, which concludes on Saturday, September 21 with National Seat Check Saturday.  For this particular event, Safe Kids will host over 500 child seat inspections nationwide and provide tips to help parents and caregivers better ensure the safety of their children.