# Driving your car with earbud/headphones on

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/driving-your-car-with-earbud-headphones-on/717362>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [April 10, 2015, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/driving-your-car-with-earbud-headphones-on/717362 "2015-04-10T19:26:38Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Stealth\_Bragg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4bbf92/32.png) [@Stealth\_Bragg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stealth_Bragg)\
**Post date:** [April 13, 2015, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/driving-your-car-with-earbud-headphones-on/717362/41 "2015-04-13T15:44:55Z")

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Ear buds make the music the primary source of auditory information.

Car stereo sounds just add to the general background noise.

It is very important to hear the important background noise in my opinion - any extra sensory input makes driving easier and safer.

Of course, a loud pumping car stereo is just as distracting.

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**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\
**Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/driving-your-car-with-earbud-headphones-on/717362/42 "2015-04-15T16:48:26Z")

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> [@steronz](#):
>
> Or, say, casual conversation with passengers. Or kids (or pets) in the back being kids (or pets). Or GPS voice directions. Or sipping a cup of coffee.
> 
> There’s lots of things that people regularly do in cars that distract them from the task at hand, and a lot of them we don’t bat an eye at. As stated upthread, some of the things that we’ve declared socially unacceptable don’t necessarily agree with the data.

All of those do indeed distract, but they don’t take your mind away from the car itself the way earphones or a handsfree phone call would.

At least with all the other things (including the phone call), you have access to hearing what’s going on around you. Earphones (especially earbuds) remove that feedback.

I would liken it to driving with very very dark sunglasses. You can still see, some - but if anything unexpected happens you don’t get enough data to react.

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**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\
**Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/driving-your-car-with-earbud-headphones-on/717362/43 "2015-04-15T21:13:31Z")

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Why are we not outlawing fancy cars that go to so much trouble to soundproof the cabin, so you’re not annoyed by all that nasty outside noise?

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