Safety campaign targets girls

Teen Vogue and Toyota have created the Arrive in Style safety campaign (and some sassy marketing) aimed at young female drivers.
   It's unfortunate that it reinforces a negative image of not only young female drivers, but also their mothers. Moms and daughters are encouraged to sign a pledge not to text or put on their lipstick, or whatever at the wheel. If it saves lives, I shouldn’t complain, even if the people described don’t have two brain cells to rub together.
   The Arrive in Style campaign was developed by Teen Vogue, Toyota Motor North America and their ad agency, Dentsu America. Kicking off with the May print edition of Teen Vogue, monthly advertorials will feature tips and advice from Toyota on different safe driving topics (such as don’t text your boyfriend while driving if you want to see him again). 
    It’s a digital age, so there will also be an “Arrive in Style” online hub, teenvogue.com/arriveinstyle. The site will feature Toyota’s Mutual Driving Agreement that mothers and daughters can e-sign and share via Facebook for a chance to win monthly prizes. In addition to signing the Agreement, teens can upload a photo on the microsite of them and their mom 'air driving' for a chance to win a trip to New York City to be featured in the February 2014 issue of Teen Vogue.
 
Arrive in Style was inspired in part, by the recent study by Toyota and the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI), which found a significant correlation between teen and parent driving behaviors, suggesting that parents are a major influence on a teen’s driving habits.  
    Dr. Tina Sayer, Toyota Collaborative Safety Research Center (CSRC) Principal Engineer and teen safe driving expert said:  “It is critical for parents to talk to their teens about driving safety and to always be the drivers they want their teens to be.”
    In conjunction with the launch of “Arrive in Style”, Toyota released new findings from the Study regarding driving behaviors of teen girls: 

• 62% of teen girls report using a cell phone while driving (handheld and/or hands-free).

• 30% reads a text or email once or more every time they drive. 

•  23% of teen girls respond to a text once or more every time they drive.

• 19% of teen girl drivers report that they have extended conversations via text message while driving.

•  51% of girls say they search for music on a portable music player, such as an iPod, while driving.

• 12% of girls report that they update or check social media, such as Facebook or Twitter, while driving.  

• 70% of teen girl drivers report they drive with two or three teen passengers and no adults in their car, which is associated with a doubling of a driver’s risk of being killed in a crash, as compared to having no passengers.[2]

 
For additional findings from the Study, please visit www.toyota.com/csrc.