'Tween' Traffic Safety Research Yields New Safety Tips for Child Passenger Safety Week
Nation's First Tween Demonstration Projects Offer Insight Into Belt Use
and Seating Position Habits of 8 to 12 Year Olds
Who: * Christene Jennings, Director of Programs, Automotive Coalition
for Traffic Safety
* Kitty Higgins, Member, National Transportation Safety Board
* Dallas, TX area family involved in recent crash in which a 12-
year-old boy properly buckled in the back seat was the LEAST
injured
What: Release of findings from new report entitled, Tween Traffic
Safety: Influencing 8- to 12-year-olds to Sit Safely Buckled in a
Back Seat based on research from demonstration programs in
Dallas, TX and Joplin, MO.
Release of tip sheet in both English and Spanish for parents
entitled, Hold on to the One You Love -- With A Seat Belt.
Updated tweensafety.org website to be launched at 12:01 a.m. on
Tuesday.
Why: While much more funding and research is devoted to infant and
toddler safety, tween fatalities are comparable to those for
younger children. More than one tween age 8 through 12 is killed
in a motor vehicle crash every day yet little focus has been
given to this age group in the past.
Statistics show that children are safest when they are properly
restrained in a back seat. Unfortunately, belt use decreases and
front seat use increases as children age. Because tweens are
tomorrow's drivers we need to find ways to help them develop the
lifelong habit of buckling up now.
When: Tuesday, February 14, 10:00 a.m.
Where: Lisagor Room of the National Press Club
529 14th Street, NW
13th Floor
Washington, DC 20045
Attention Editors:
B-roll of tweens in automobiles and of interviews with tweens and parents is available.
PRNewswire -- Feb. 9