When you hit the road after a sleepless night, you might think it will not do anyone any harm. But did you know that drowsy driving kills a large number of people every year, rivaling even texting and driving incidents?
But why is it that lacking sleep can pose such a danger to drivers?
Drowsiness and intoxication
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration examines some dangers associated with driving drowsy. Drowsiness affects the body in a way similar to intoxicating substances. This means that drowsy drivers often struggle with reflexes, have slowed reactions and cannot even identify dangers in time to appropriately respond to them at times.
The level of impact a driver faces depends on the lack of sleep, too. However, any amount of sleep deprivation could potentially serve as enough of an issue to cause a crash. After all, it only takes a second of lapsed attention to rear-end a car in front of you.
Emotional instability
Lacking sleep not only affects your judgment and physical state of being, but it also affects you emotionally, too. Many drowsy drivers find themselves bursting into road rage at a higher rate than drivers in a sober and calm state of mind.
These drivers also suffer from a higher rate of distraction, often struggling to keep their attention trained on the road as it should be. Again, this leads to seconds of lost time that could end in a crash. Due to these potential impacts on driver safety, it is important for all drivers to understand the true repercussions of hitting the road without enough sleep.