The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Click It or Ticket (CIOT) campaign is in full force Memorial Day weekend, with police officers around the nation cracking down on those who “forget” to wear their seatbelts. Wearing a seat belt is the number one thing you can do to protect yourself should you be involved in a car accident – buckling up saves tens of thousands of lives each year. That is why signs around the country scream “buckle up” this week.
Yet, many of the seat belt culprits are too young to read the signs. According to a recent survey by Dr. Lilia B. Reyes at Yale Medical School, almost three quarters of children know how to unbuckle a seat belt by the time they are three years old – and more than 40 percent of children act on that knowledge by unbuckling their seat belts during the ride.
Telling your children to buckle up could mean the difference between life and death. Properly restraining children with safety belts and booster seats can increase their chances of surviving a car crash by 70-80 percent.
How can we convince our young children that buckling up is important? The threat of a ticket during the Click It or Ticket campaign won’t deter them. Parents, other grown-ups and older children are the key. Those that lead by example have the most impact – parents who buckle up send a signal to their children: this is important.
Many cars have alarms that beep when someone in the front seat unbuckles. There is a push to add the same feature for backseat passengers. Until then, parents must keep an eye on their preschoolers and other kids.