Edmunds.com Offers Parents Advice for Keeping Teen Drivers Safe

Edmunds.com Offers Parents Advice for Keeping Teen Drivers Safe

SANTA MONICA, Calif. — March 22, 2011 — Edmunds.com, the premier online resource for automotive information, urges parents to step up supervision of newly licensed teenage drivers to teach them responsibility and to keep them safer on the road. The guidance comes in the new Edmunds.com article "Expert Advice for Parents About Teen Driving," published by Temple University professor Laurence Steinberg, Ph.D.

"Many parents believe that their role in the adolescent's driving career ends as soon as he or she has received a driver's license," says Dr. Steinberg, who is the author of a number of books including You and Your Adolescent. "In fact this is precisely the time when your supervision is crucial. Most parents discuss the dangers of drinking and driving with their new drivers but fail to discuss other equally important factors."

While many states have written laws specifically regulating teenage driving, Dr Steinberg says that all parents should enforce the following rules on their teenage drivers:

• Do not allow your teenager to drive with other teen passengers until he or she is experienced behind the wheel.
• Limit driving in less safe conditions like at night and in bad weather.
• Do not allow your teenager to talk or otherwise use any phone, smartphone or PDA while driving.
• Set an example for your teenager by practicing safe driving behavior yourself.
• Make it clear that driving is a privilege and be prepared to suspend that privilege if necessary.

"Thanks to technology, moms and dads can now electronically ride shotgun with their teens by tracking their whereabouts in real-time, monitoring their behind-the-wheel behavior with a video camera, recording whether they're driving too fast or in a forbidden area and even limiting how loud they can crank the stereo," notes Edmunds.com Senior Technology Editor Doug Newcomb in his story at http://www.edmunds.com/car-technology/tracking-teen-drivers.html. "Apps" such as the Mobile Tattletale http://mobiletattletale.com/solutions/ can also prove useful.

For Dr. Steinberg's full advice on how to keep your teenager driver safe, please visit Edmunds.com at http://www.edmunds.com/car-safety/expert-advice-for-parents-about-teen-driving.html.

To learn more about technology that allows parents to monitor their teen drivers, see http://www.edmunds.com/car-technology/tracking-teen-drivers.html.

Edmunds.com also offers advice for choosing the right driver's education program at http://www.edmunds.com/car-safety/finding-drivers-ed-programs-that-really-work.html.

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Edmunds publishes Web sites that empower, engage and educate automotive consumers, enthusiasts and insiders. Edmunds.com, the premier online resource for automotive information, launched in 1995 as the first automotive information Web site and hosts the most established automotive community online. Its mobile site, accessible from any smartphone at www.edmunds.com, makes car pricing and other research tools available for car shoppers at dealerships and otherwise on the go. InsideLine.com is the most-read automotive enthusiast Web site. Its mobile site, accessible from any smartphone at www.insideline.com, features the wireless Web's highest quality car photos and videos. AutoObserver.com provides insightful automotive industry commentary and analysis. Edmunds is headquartered in Santa Monica, California, and maintains a satellite office in suburban Detroit. Follow Edmunds.com on Twitter@edmunds and fan Edmunds.com on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/edmunds.