Are Booster Seats Actually Safer Than Just Seatbelts?
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I used to have that exact same baby blue sweater 😐
How did you get my sweater, Simon? 🤨
21:00 if you search "seat belt adjuster for adults" you'll see that 'average adult passenger,' like so many things in safety and health, really means "average adult male." Many women aren't safely served by seatbelts unless they are adjusted so that they don't cut into our necks while wearing them.
Female police and military personnel still wear protective vests designed for men's torsos, and seat belts are not designed for female bodies.
Wow... I was going to say you summed up all of the common sense things I was going to say about this subject matter.
Then after looking at the timestamp this was a 25-minute video I said well perhaps you didn't sum it up. I would have said the same thing without the conflicting and or problematic study data.
Video begins at 1:13
Having done quite a bit of road accident rescue (which is all too often recovery) I've learned a few things that I tell anyone who'll listen.
Number one: Always buckle your children up and stop the car if you must. "just around the corner" there's a guy leaving a twelve hour shift who'll run a red light. Even if you're a great driver, you're protecting them from everyone else.
Number two: never ride a motorcycle without all your gear. Leather can be replaced, skin not so much.
Number three, is the one that was a behaviour change for me, which two accidents made me realise.
Whenever I get on a bus, or a train, I always sit in a rear facing seat and put my child beside me... With me on the aisle side, for extra parental supervision.
Reason being, the bus or train has no seatbelts and when a train or a bus crashes at cruising speed... It tends to get real serious, real fast.
People sitting in rear facing seats are always, always better off and it's not difficult to wrap your head around how that works.
People thinking "it won't happen" have never seen how often it does happen and how absolutely fucked your life can be because you couldn't be bothered to buckle up, put on a jacket, or choose the rear facing seats.
Yeah, the problem is those people who think it won't happen to them because they're great drivers. There's a point in a car accident when physical forces beyond one's control take over, and you might as well just sit there and enjoy what may be your last ride ever. The way cars are built provides a great illusion of safety that's as easily shattered as the glass.
I remember after they decided passengers didn't need to wear seatbelts in pick up trucks in Indiana. I thought it was crazy. My dad mentioned it one day when we got in his truck, I was 16 at the time. I told him I'd rather wear it. One week later, my boyfriend hit a dip in the road while driving his dad's pick up and overcorrected, running into a cornfield. We weren't even going fast but he hit it just right that we went spinning. My mom's old babysitter, a retired EMT, saw everything while she was gardening in her yard. She ran to help us, sure we were dead. We were both perfectly fine, not even a seatbelt mark. I got hit in the face by a coffee tumbler so I had a bruise on my cheek, that was the only injury. We weren't even sore the next day.
So yeah, anyone who says seatbelts don't save lives can kick rocks. I also won't go anywhere without my kids safely buckled in. I make sure their car seats/booster seats are as tight as they will go, very little wiggle room. My 3yo still faces backwards and will continue for the next year or two. My husband would always complain that their legs looked uncomfortable or was worried about broken legs if we got into an accident. "I'd rather they had broken legs than a spinal injury." Honestly, if I could find a rear facing car seat that was crash tested for my 5yo, she'd be facing the back too.
I'm the very unfun mom when it comes to major safety concerns. When my kids fall down though, I'm the "You okay? Good. Brush it off"
@@UnicornsPoopRainbows Good for you! Seatbelts have saved my life on two occasions. Without them, I would have been pavement pizza, and they would have been scraping me into a bag. I'd add to OP's list the following: GET HEAVY OBJECTS OUT OF YOUR PASSENGER COMPARTMENT AND PUT THEM IN THE TRUNK! Things like gallons of milk tend to fly and might internally decapitate someone. If you're in a roll, the windows will break as the car deforms, and everything in there will fly out. Don't be in its way. Been there, done that.
@@UnicornsPoopRainbows Yeah I cannot wrap my head around people who don't put their belt on... But people who don't belt their kids, well every kid deserves parents, but not every parent deserves kids.
I mean, how stupid do you actually have to be to fail to understand that simple cause and effect thought experiment?
And a pickup truck, which in Australia we kinda call a ute, but you mean a body on chassis full commercial style vehicle in this instance, is the vehicle you MOST want a seatbelt on for as they usually aren't required to meet the same safety standards as other passenger vehicles.
Crumple zones in cars, despite making the wreck look totally non-survivable, means the car took the impact and not your body (or bodies).
When I worked in the mining industry, we had lights on the top so the bosses could see if we had our belt clipped in from afar. People would often get into my LandCruiser and clip it in behind their backs, to which I would say: So you're walking out of the pit in the 45 degree heat are you? No? Well put the fucking belt on properly and don't ever let me see that again.
People would ask why I'd get so wound up just on the roads on site, and that's simple. If in the unlikely event of a crash, sure the belt won't help if we go over the edge, or we're run over by a CAT-793 Haul truck. We'd all be paste in-between a two baking trays (look up a video of a CAT-793 Runs over LandCruiser, we did that at our site, because we could. Oh, and a safety demo or something). But what a belt will do, in a survivable roll over, for example, is not only keep me in place, but stop the 150kg Driller sitting in the passenger seat from becoming a flying bag of bones and meat and crushing me.
So it's like, yes as much as I hate the government legislating common sense, especially in this quietly authoritarian country, I have realised that people are fucking stupid and occasionally need to be told there's a rule in place because you're too dense to not kill me and my family happens to like seeing me not die. Plus, a big part of my life experience has been collecting up bits of people, some heartbreakingly young, because they were "just going around the corner."
God it's just so irritating, I want people to be as free as the next thinking man or woman, but when so many of us deliberately do things the rest of us pay for... And getting fucked up in a car wreck is something we ALL pay for... Then I kinda feel like we can't handle the responsibility. You are doing the right thing though, there's times to let kids take risks, they get hurt and that's part of growing. But there's risks they're not able to comprehend and that's where we make the choices. Failure to do so is a blight on one's character, never even trust a person who doesn't buckle up their kids to feed your goldfish.
Ontario is phasing in seatbelts in buses (starting with school buses). Some news outlets unearthed a 2010 study showing buses were not safe and the padded interior didn’t provide adequate protection
As a short person I'm here to advocate for more adjustable seat belts. I hate being strangled as I drive down the road 😊
Yes!!!! I’m a 5’8” female and still have issues with the seatbelt at the lowest setting cutting across my neck
@@morganhough1022 There's seatbelt wraps you can get to mitigate this, or you can get The Tiddy Bear (google it!). Ideally none of these should be necessary but that's how it is.
@@morganhough1022 Is 5'8" supposed to be short?
oh, I love short people! They make wonderful armrests. :p
Search "seat belt adjuster for adults," the 'average adult passenger' is actually the average adult male. It's not just you, those belts are actually pretty difficult to wear safely for many women. Like me .🙄 💖
22:45 THANK YOU!! As a 5ft adult, EVERY airbag and EVERY shoulder seatbelt is DANGEROUS to me. EVERY single head rest in every car is also too high to do me any good, and just low enough to force my head and neck into uncomfortable positions that create additional problems over time - nevermind leaving me at a greater risk of an upper neck injury in a crash. If I survive an airbag attempting to smother my airway and burn my face off, that is.
Skill issue
If you didn't know you can get an adult car seat cushion for that
"smother your airway" ???
Airbags deflate nearly as fast as they inflate.
When your small you can adjust things. When your very tall, you are screwed.
Not like you to be whinging c*** Seliah. 😂😂😂
I live in Sweden (one of the mentioned Scandinavian countries) and my solution was to rent the car seats directly from the insurance company. First a baby seat, after nine months send that one back for a child seat that still can be placed reversed and finally at 4 years switch that to a booster seat with a back. All of the seats are mounted with ISOfix so it’s easier to make sure it’s properly installed which was a big concern for me. Not a cheap solution but cheaper than buying and the insurance company can’t complain about my seat choice if something happens 😁
Used good stores are great for baby stuff. Once you're done just donate it back to the store.
@@flufffycow it is not recommended (at least in Canada) to buy used car seat. It is not save to use a car seat that have been in an accident and you can't be sure of that by buying used. There is also "do not use after" date on car seats because of how plastic degrade over time.
We have the same recommendations in Sweden as well.
Isofix can only handle 18kg, remeber that.
Do not buy a child seat used.... chrimminy
14:46 "So, note to self; favorite child goes in the middle." Here's my thumbs up for whoever wrote that in the script.
The joke definitely went over Simon's head. As he said in another show, sometimes the script just goes from eye to mouth and he doesn't even get a chance to process what he's saying. 😅
When I was a baby, the car my mom was driving was rear-ended. From what my mom says, I slept through the whole thing, even though a pile of clean laundry fell on top of me in my car seat 😂
My parents wouldn’t even start the car until our seatbelts were on and fastened. It was good training.. I still put my seatbelt on before I even turn the car on.
Yep
Never had a problem keeping my kid properly buckled in his car seat. If the straps are properly tightened they can’t pull their arms out. I used a few easy steps to keep even the most wilful children in my care safe in their seats (regardless of age).
1. If they unbuckle, pull their arms out, strap behind their back or whatever pull over. Inform them you won’t be moving till their properly buckled. Be firm and consistent. Every time it happens you pull over. With older children and teenagers giving the breaks a firm love tap can also be effective.
2. Car crash videos, showing them how the dummy flies out of the window, or bounces around the car like a bouncy ball is also very effective.
3. Start them young. And never compromise on safety. My son, even ratted my mom out when she took him around the corner without telling me in her car at like 4 and more recently told on his younger cousin for not wearing a seatbelt (again with my mother 🙄) when she took them somewhere while staying with her for a weekend.
4. When staying with other people like grandparents always install their car seat in their vehicle yourself. Don’t trust that others will take the time and effort to properly install your child’s car seat or booster. Even your own mother because they won’t 🙄
100% on these points.
We recently moved and the bookshelves were out long ways for safety, except one. I made sure to show my daughter videos of kids climbing stuff and it crashing. We are renting so can't make holes in the walls. A proper Convo and visual aids help kids a lot in understanding danger
@@UnicornsPoopRainbows Double check your local laws, many places have laws that say landlords can't ban you from securing your furniture to the wall, they can only require you to repair the damage before you leave. I know that sometimes you can be in a difficult situation where you can't afford to p*** off the landlord no matter what the law says but it may not hurt to ask.
I would be more interested in a study to see if boosters are more or less dangerous that a seatbelt alone. My kids all liked using a booster seat as it allowed them to see out of the windows and increased their enjoyment of actually riding in the car.
Well, by listening to the studies in the video, you can easily come to the conclusion that it doesn't really matter. If your kid wants a booster, buy a booster. If he doesn't, then don't buy one.
@@bobthegoat7090 Really? My takeaway was that it was inconclusive when comparing all the studies, not that it didn't matter. There is a difference.
@@donaldroehrig7817 You are right that it was technically inconclusive however most of the studies saw small margins in favor of one or the other, so while you may not be able to conclude which is safer it is fairly safe to conclude there isn't a big difference as otherwise the studies should have reached the same conclusions of which is better. If they are just about equally safe you would expect studies to reach different conclusions like this. Also what do you actually mean by 'I would be more interested in a study to see if boosters are more or less dangerous'? At least two of the studies answered this question/tried to answer them.
Also I am just an armchair scientist so this is just the conclusions I have reached for myself
www.cdc.gov/transportationsafety/child_passenger_safety/cps-factsheet.html
@Lurch but how's a parent supposed to mom arm their kid if the kid's not in the front seat. 😉
My brother was about 7 years old. We were going home from running errands. He was in the back of my Beetle focused on his dvd player. We took a very sharp on ramp and he went flying across the back, crashing into the opposite side. We yelled at him to buckle up, he did, visibly shaken. He never forgot to buckle again. He's 22 now.
My cousin, a 20-year-old stunning brunette, didn't buckle up in a rear seat and was thrown out of the car in an accident. Everyone else in the car survived.
Living in rural Midwest USA, my dad would put a topper on the back of the pickup truck, put a mattress in it, and tell us to ride in the back. Great fun!!! (but in hindsight very dangerous)
You got a cap and a mattress? We got nothing, just metal and hold on, dad would go slightly slower than normal
@@UnicornsPoopRainbows The cap actually made it more dangerous, as they tend to capture carbon monoxide from the exhaust if not properly vented.
I rode in the back of my dad's pickup all the time. The only injuries I ever suffered were when I was a bit in too much of a hurry and tried to get out before the truck had come to a full stop. I fell head over heels and landed on my ass. It was a bit sore for a week or two after that. 😅
I got bungee cords and a lounge chair! Lol and rode backwards because of course I did. The things we survived!
I rode in the back of a pickup many times as a kid - it was awesome! Also a midwesterner, and born in 1964. I don't even remember if our cars had seat belts in the first place. Amazing we survived, eh? 😅
@@choklityum and amazing you used eh, eh? 😜
I love the rear facing seats on trains - it feels more comfortable. I'd love that in planes as well
Same. I will go for one if it's an option, so much better.
airplanes already have rear facing seats.
@@SoloRenegade yeah, for the flight attendants
@@waffles3629 many charter jets and light twins have rear facing seats, single engine turbo props, personal jets, etc. Many bombers and such had rear facing seats for engineers, navigators, gunners, etc.
Where I lived prior to my son being born in 2010, you could go to the fire station, and they would not only correctly install the car seat, they would teach you how to uninstall and install it correctly.
In the US, any fire station will do this for you.
Most do it near me still, sometimes you have to call and make an appointment though. Super helpful!
The car we had when I was a kid simply had a plastic hook halfway down the height of the seat on the frame that you slid the belt through which lowered its position to fit children. Simple and easily implemented in cars or trucks (maybe not minivans, though) no booster required.
I'm wondering how sturdy that hook was tho
I’d argue a 5 point nhra approved racing harness for each seat would drastically reduce deaths and injuries to all occupants in all collisions.
Im a car seat technician, with 5 years of experience with over 1000 installs on my belt. I found this video interesting. Most points were brought up that id bring up.
The main thing id say about booster seats (not convertible car seats or infant carriers) is the back seat was not designed for someone that small. A booster is designed to "boost" the child and guide the lap and sholder belt into the proper position. Most of the time, the problem is improper use or bad understanding. The amount of time I've told people that a 3 year old shouldn't be in a booster, unless they are 40" tall and 40 pounds (the requirements in canada, where im from) and see people ignore me and do it anyway.
5 point harness is best, use it as long as you can.
Is that advice based on any crash experience?
A 5-7 point harness is much safer than a regular seat belt but it's really hard to get it all right when the car seat is buckled into the car. When 1 parent takes the car seat out and then sets it in the back seat and the other parent doesn't notice so the kiddo gets properly strapped in but the car seat isn't connected to anything it's very dangerous to the kid.
This is a great argument against 2 parent households
Or when an older sibling unclicks it by mistake because she thought it was her seatbelt and doesn’t tell anyone for days.
I love that in that video clip the dad keeps putting the seatbelt under the child's arm even while Simon was talking about how to place the seatbelt properly
The school bus seats may be designed to cushion a child in an accident but may of the school busses I rode on had at least a couple seats missing the foam leaving the metal bars exposed to my pimpley face 😂
Well, if y'all weren't destructive little fu¢ks that wouldn't have been an issue... Side note, I was one of those bus kids too.
The width problem when putting multiple boosters in a row really is such a problem! Last weekend my mother in law, sister in law, and our kids and I all had to pile into the same 5-seat vehicle. We put my nephew's big full restraint carseat in a side spot, my daughter and her backless booster in the middle, and then I was expected to sit in the other side spot beside her. I had half the intended seat space and my leg was resting uncomfortably on top of her added cup holder.
I think the thing that sums up the whole discussion is, "no perfect data set exists". For obvious reasons we simply cannot create a proper dataset with controls. That would, quite literally, require intentionally harming a certain number of children. Thus, we are left doing the best we can based on the information we have.
Nothing government does is for your safety. It’s about money
I can't help but think that this video grew from Simon's quest to find out how to keep his children as safe as possible. Going further down the research rabbit hole led an idea for the channel's writers.
My dad used to put my brothers in the boot when we had too many friends in the car in the 80s.🤣😳
This bit of parents letting kids be this disobedient is stupid. I did the same with my kids as my parents did with me, " If you are to ever go out of this house again, you better listen when I tell you to do something and do it." My son didn't leave the house for 2 months because he thought I wouldn't notice he unclipped his belt. It was a giant pain in the ass for me and my husband. It was torture for him since his siblings were getting to go to the park, friends houses, movies, etc. and he had to stay home with dad or grandma. After that I never had that problem again. It also cut down on his siblings defiance because they realized I would do what I said I would.
I'm like this with my kids over big safety stuff but not as long. My daughter didn't listen and ran across the entrance of the parking garage because she was mad at me. I caught up to her, she got a talking to and had to hold my hand when walking outside for the next 2weeks. That meant she also didn't use her kickboard during that time. She got complacent since we moved to a safer area. We were almost hit several times last year just trying to walk through our apartment complex. If she tries running or even walking across without looking again, she will be using the stroller
@@UnicornsPoopRainbows Good on you! Your poor heart must have been pounding out of your chest. The could-be's your mind shows you. Ugh!
I Almost backed over a kid one time. I was backing out of a grocery store parking space. I had SUV's on each side of my little car and couldn't see well. A minute or 2 later I found out the father was texting and not holding the kids hand. Luckily, he (the dad) saw what was happening in time and kicked my car causing me to stop before i hit him. The dad acted like it was my fault and I believed him but for a witness that came to my defence. "The witness read the man out for not keeping an eye on his kid in a parking lot.
The If's of that day still haunt me. I couldn't have lived with myself if the worst had happened. It would have detroyed me as much as the kid's parents. Whether it was my fault or not. To mitigate the chances, I have backed into parking spaces since. You can see better.
I'd love rear facing seats. Also a five-point harness. Driving is the most dangerous thing we do in our daily lives, and I'd do whatever to minimize the risk of something terrible happening to me or a family member.
As a short adult I have often had problems with unadjustable belts crossing over my neck instead of my shoulder. Newer cars often have adjustable ones (which at my height is helpful but still puts the belt high enough to be worrisome), but there are additional clips to modify that height, though they don't work in the middle seat because it doesn't have the other part of the belt to clip it to. It would seem that a booster placed in the middle would need to be one with a back that places the chest belt correctly (which could be used in any seat but is safer in the middle), while a backless booster could be used with the placement clip in the outer seats.
When the belt is digging into your neck, you're much more likely to place the belt behind you regardless of your age. In the US many police departments will help you properly install any car seat if you ask.
We used harnesses with our kids. the main difference was that it distributed the force along two collar bones and away from the neck altogether.
I get motion sick if I sit facing backwards. i suspect that's not a solution for some people.
Same! I avoid rear-facing seats in trains and busses for this very reason. It's not always a problem, but I don't think the other passengers would enjoy dealing with puke.
The problem with the way a lot of people think about car accidents is that they fail to realize that car crashes are three dimensional. Also, seat belts are great for stopping forward motion, yes, however they are really bad at stopping side to side motion. If your car spins, which is highly likely in a head on collision, since it's rare for both cars to align perfectly in a head on collision, your head will hit the side window.
To the windows,
To the walls
This is why fulll backed booster seats with side head protection is very important
@@dsxa918 Yeah, and I was in an accident in which I was hit by a drunk going over 80 mph on a country road. The car spun, and my head smacked right into the driver's side window. A day or two later my head freakishly swelled up and my face turned green from bruising. Fun times!
I've seen a few SUVs with what looks to be side cushioning.
Good thing most proper child seats have those "ears" (and more recently even adjustable firm spacers to the car door/side), adding at least some sideways protection.
FYI: When flying on US Air Force cargo jets equipped with passenger seats, the seats are installed to face the rear of the aircraft.
Search for Coronel Stapp ;)
Even if a car seat isn't significantly improving safety, it undeniably makes the belt more comfortable for kids. I've seen so many young children put the shoulder strap behind their back because they don't like the feeling of it on their neck.
when I was a little child, cars didn’t eben have seatbelts for the backseats and there was no law stating that you have to use the seatbelts when you were sitting in a backseat.
Needless to say that the mortality rate for car accidents was much higher than it is today…
When I was a child same was true, but Ralph Nader's "Unsafe at Any Speed had just come out when my dad bought a new car, and he installed three seatbelts in the back seat for us kids. Mom would never put the car in gear until checking all seatbelts were on until we were teenagers.
I'm not prone to motion sickness, but backwards facing forward motion makes me really queasy feeling
I acknowledge that happens, I wonder whether it's nature or nurture?
The US navy has rear facing passenger seats for their delivery planes. Even the fighter pilots get sick in them.
Same. It only takes a few minutes before I'm ready to hurl.
I once had a van (toyota sienna I think) that had the option for integrated child seats. Basically a regular seat where part of the back folds forward and down to reveal a smaller internal seat with 5 point harness. Really... Why aren't these just standard in rear seats in all cars?
Probably because after an accident safety seats have to be completely replaced.
Also in the winter make sure that the seatbelt is under the coat the person is wearing not over it. I can tell you from personal experience what happens when you get in a car accident with your seatbelt over a bulky coat, especially if the accident include multiple impacts that throw you repeatedly against the belt. That extra gap between your body and the belt means you get some nice extra acceleration before the belt stops you. In my case I was in the back seat and the driver managed to bounce the car through a ditch off various objects for 50 yards or so and I got thrown against the belt so many times I got the wind knocked out of me and the seat belt cracked some of my ribs. I vividly remember the sensation of flying forward 3-4" and being jerked to a stop by the belt over and over again as we bounced through the ditch. Not fun.
My two kids and former spouse were involved in a head on collision when a driver came over a blind hill on the wrong side of the road and hit them head on. Both were in booster seats. One child was asleep with a loose seatbelt slumped over, and the other was awake and upright. The latter child walked away with bruises on her hips, the other ended up on a helicopter to a major hospital with a broken collar bone and a bruised lung among other injuries and spend two days in the hospital. Seat belt positioning is critical.
For a small child that tends to "submarine" under an adult seat belt in an accident already, the gap the coat creates could also make "submarining" more likely as the belt would be looser than normal.
My 9yo keeps his booster (which the laws say he doesn't have to). I suspect he just wants the cup holders.
Win win
I don’t think it should be up to your son whether he “keeps” it or not…you should be deciding
@@chrisinsd4590 Why do you think I have to be a harda## about it? He still fits, even 7 months after the original post, he's not quite to the upper weight limit, and he can still put on his seatbelt properly, so it's not endangering anyone either way. I only pull rank when I feel it's necessary. That'll be soon enough.
I kept my son in a 5 point harness till he was 8... now he's just using a seat belt. If my wallet could handlethe cost, my car would have 5 point harnesses in every seat.
I'd have to wear a heavily cushion crotch protection
@@dsxa918yeah. 4 point all the way.
Which seat did you use?
@@terrabledsoe4812 A Graco that transitioned from rear to forward facing.... it also helps that my son is skinny for his age so he fit longer than i would of at his age.
Around 8:00 in you've got an image on screen that stays up for almost a minute. I was hoping you'd use it as an example of how improper use can completely negate any safety a car seat could bring, but you don't address it. It's two toddlers buckled into car seats while wearing puffy winter coats. Most people don't realize how much those coats compress in the event of a collision. You cannot get the straps tight enough around the child for them to do any good and the likelihood of ejection from the car goes way up.
Luckily, many blogs and advice articles for parents mention this, and even some coat tags do, too! I just warm up the car so the kids don't feel compelled to wear a coat in the car.
Yep coats off. If it's cold put them on backwards OVER the straps.
@@ZhovtoBlakytniy You'd hope but even advertising by car seat manufacturers show incorrect use in other countries. Korea is terrible about it. Korea Britax uploaded a user photo of a kid with super loose straps on Instagram as well as forward facing infants. They were notified, global headquarters was also notified. Nothing happened and the aunt of the kid started attacking people in the comments calling out the improper use. Of all the other parents I've seen out their kids in and out of carseats in Korea at daycare pick up/drop off, most used them incorrectly if they had any at all. Hell, many parents are even told not to put their newborns in carseats at the hospital when they take the kid home! "It will hurt their spine. You have to hold them in the car." By nurses, recently!
I'm very annoyed about the car seat issue here. A lot of kids are injured because they aren't buckled in at all here. Luckily most injuries are very middle, usually messing about while the car is parked. It is just a big pet peeve of mine. Parents who take their kids to a plastic surgeon for a fat lip but can't strap them in the car safely...
When I was growing up, our safety relied on my parents throwing their hand and arm in front of us, which even though my kids were in car seats, I also did instinctively lol. I did use car seats with my now 33 & 36 year old sons, but I was horrified when my now 26 y/o daughter was born, I found out during a class by the fire department that I had been doing it completely wrong.
Also, what is up with the doll that’s used in the example for babies safety seat? It looks terrifying in the picture. And when placing the older child in the seat, the father places the upper strap under the child’s arm. Just saying…
throwing your arm out in front of them is literally pointless at like 30mph+. the weight of the child moving 30 mph is far too much force for anyone to stop in any meaningful amount
In a real accident, I don't see how that would help. The physical forces involved are so great that your arm would fly forward with everything else. You'd be better off not moving at all to reduce the chance of breaking or losing your arm. You might need that arm to escape the car and render aid.
I never much cared for getting hit in the chest every time someone pulled out in front of us. I always said the parent arm was more dangerous than the crash.
@@FFNOJG, and every one who pointed out the danger and uselessness of this. My parents did this starting when I was born in 1957, long before there were car seats. I always used a car seat from the moment they came home from the hospital. At that time, car seats were placed in the front seat facing forward, if no one else was there. Obviously, more info is known now. I certainly do NOT recommend this ridiculous method. I was just relating my own experience. I always get razzed by my kids since I still do this.
I know for a fact my mom didn't think that'd _actually_ help, it was just an automatic reaction. I knew my MIL considered me one of her kids when she did the arm thing to me, lol.
My parents got car seats for us when we were very little back in the late 70s. Dad was a firefighter/emt
I don’t comment much on videos but I love the content of this video so much I am hoping a comment boosts people seeing this. This is such important information. I see people using car seats and boosters incorrectly so often. I was recently hit and reminded how anything can happen at any time and it doesn’t matter how safe a driver YOU are. Other people are out there driving drunk, driving upset, texting, etc.
You can always tell when Simon learns something new. He will make a dozen videos in a week that all cover the same topic. Next up, warographics episode on seatbelts, then a BB episode on airbags and babies…
TL;DW: Boosters might be good, but the data sucks and is misrepresented by the booster seat industry to keep sales going.
That appears to apply to other things called boosters as well ...
Marketing doesn’t care about your usefulness.
I once had a minivan where the middle row seats could be set to face backwards. I had so many people try to tell me that it would be unsafe to sit that way in a vehicle, I couldn't believe how many people were under that misconception!
Unfortunately though it seems that someone in the US government agrees too, because the new Kia EV9 has middle row seats that can face backwards, but not in north america because they say that the US safety rules wouldn't allow it!
(I can tell you, that in addition to safety benefits, a 3 row vehicle with a rear facing middle row is also far more practical and spacious than 3 forward facing rows!)
That's interesting. The Kia Carnival has a similar set up, you can turn the middle seats backwards in NA but not South Korea. We're probably going to update to that car soon but I was really excited for that feature that I won't be able to use. The Korean car reviewers were pretty confused and annoyed about it too, there is no reason for them to take that function away. We can take the seats out but not put them rear facing.
Additional note: while the rear center is the safest, if it isn't an option (due to having additional children, for instance) the seats behind the driver are the second safest, as the driver's instincts will tend towards prioritizing the driver side safety in the moments leading up to an accident. The more you know.
Thanks Dwight
I found I didn't have time to prioritize anything before I was hit head on. If I'd had time, I would have driven into the ditch on the side of the road.
That's an old wives tale. Passenger side is safer than drivers. Think about it, which side is the on coming traffic etc.
Getting kids out into oncoming traffic every time you park on the side of the road is more likely to cause death or injury than the much less likely chance of being in a major accident. Drivers can get in and out of the car much more quickly and spend less time next to passing traffic than a child can.
@@ElizabethJones-pv3sj exactly that's why vans with only doors on one side are on the passenger side
Seats have changed so much, including ease of use, since most of these studies were done.
Yes! Like the ISOfix seats. They are so much easier than the older car seats. The old booster seats didn't strap into anything, iirc. My kid's is also ISOfix, full backed, has side head impact protection and a seatbelt adjuster
Well done & thank you Simon. I have been using these contraptions on and off for many decades with my kids, their kids and other kids. The key challenges are proper design, proper utilization and strictly enforced discipline by the vehicle operator and the passengers. I know for a fact that they do save lives and prevent injury.
There are physiological reasons for not sitting backwards in cars. We are built to balance facing forwards.
The main improvement in booster seats with a back vs no back is that typically they feature a device to hold the sash part of the seatbelt in the correct position. It's also not hard to find a 5 point harness seat that suits an older child, I have one that fits my almost 7 year old and has room to grow.
Sorry but I would get sick facings backwards. I don't want to take Dramamine each time I was a passenger.
As a parent, it's really not that hard to position the seat belt properly in a booster. The booster we currently have does also have straps to attach to the anchor points meant for child restraints, so that reduces issues with it as well. As for kids putting the shoulder strap under their arm or behind their back... That comes down to parenting. I think each of my kids tried that like once? At which time I told them absolutely that it's not safe and we don't ride like that. I told them if they kept it up they would go back to a five point harness (those come sized for really big kids these days). None of them ever did it again. I do think modular seating/adjustable belts are the way of the future, safer for every occupant in the vehicle. I have a few female friends that barely reach 5 feet tall and struggle in their seat belt fit. My father in law is quite large and round and struggles with his locking on him at inappropriate times. But considering that a century ago there were no carseats, mid 20th century no infant seats (my mother born in 1950 rode in her mother's arms), lap belts only in the rear seat into the 80's, and air bags came about in the 90's and were only in the steering wheel, things have progressed a ton and hopefully will continue to do so
I get car/air/train/bus sick facing the wrong way :( Edit: Also I heard that the main reason for any kind of child restraint was more because kids are more likely to remove safety belts, so to force them into a booster seat where they can't remove it makes it safer.
I mean, technically the best seat belt solution is a 5 point harness, but that's terribly inconvenient. The only reason we don't use 5 point harnesses is because it takes longer than 2 seconds to put on.
My husband doesn't even put his seatbelt on until the car complains to him so I can imagine how many people just wouldn't bother
Le sigh thats a point that makes me mad. I get stuck with deadly airbags I can't turn off because we gotta keep stupid ,en who won't use a 5pt harness safe. Like let me decide
From this video, we can all gain an understanding of the importance of not being in a car accident.
Drive safely, guys 🙏
Can verify you will survive 100% of all car accidents you never have! 👍
Your delivery of information is second to none. The fluid delivery appears to be out of you head vs. looking at cheat sheets/notes. I can not imagine you are able to "have all the info at the tip of your tongue, " Bravo on a job, well done, however you accomplish your presentations.
He speaks too quickly, garbles phrases, and mispronounces common words too frequently.
On a note to this, I used to ride in a Volvo that had a really good solution to the booster seat problem. In short, part of the seat folded above the rest of the seat, making the seat belt not cut necks and the like.
I use both a booster seat and seatbelt adjuster, but I'm also not a parent, just a nanny. Still, I do find using both together works pretty well, at least compared to not having anything. Obviously, a real carseat would be best, but since it costs less than $50 for a booster and seatbelt adjuster, compared to minimum $100 for a decent carseat, I think what I have is good enough.
I bought a booster seat for my 5yo that is full back, head protection, and has a seat belt adjuster built in. The adjuster is really important, I don't think a seat belt strangling the kid in an accident is going to be all that beneficial to continuing to live 🤕
Favorite child in back, middle. Check. Lmao
Slipped that one in there for sure😂
We need a DTU episode on lizard people. Please 🙏
I love that you mentioned that everyone rear-facing is safer. NASA has done extensive research, which I probably found on one of your other videos, on how much G-forces a human can survive and best methods. It would be nice if we at least had the option in our cars.
I was on a fully loaded school bus, maybe a mile or two from getting to the school, when I heard a little thump and what sounded like a water large water balloon popping. For some reason i thought it was a prank, because the bus driver slowed and came to a stop afterwards and the sound made me think a kid threw a water jug in front of the bus as it drove by. When i got a look back though I was stunned, what i thought was the sound of a water jug thumping and popping was the sound of the bus plowing through an huge SUV that either didn't acknowledge that they had a stop sign or didn't acknowledge that a bus was coming. Point is, most accidents that severely hurt and kill occupants funny have the same effect with a bus. So they're probably just safer as their size eliminates what would be dangerous in smaller vehicles.
That SUV got demolished, the liquid sound was all the fluids and maybe fuel gushing out of the two chunks of SUV and engine. I wouldn't have even noticed if I was listening to music. Luckily, there was only the driver in the SUV in the far side of the impact that, as far as we could tell, was fine. You don't need a ton of engineered safety technology to survive when your vehicle weighs many tons more than most others.
I think secreting the kid in a sack and tossing them in the trunk is the safest option.
Oh, wait this isn’t about not getting caught. My bad.
As a new parent, this video is great! You should do one on how the statistics of SIDs are made. They tell everyone the same chances of SIDS, but when you look into what data is included, it includes parents who are alcoholics, homeless parents, parents who don't own beds and have to sleep on couches with their children. When we removed those factors from it for our household, the chance of SIDS was so incredibly low, they were more likely to get struck by lightning twice than SIDS from sharing a bed with us. (Disclaimer, I know this is going to bring out Parents who think they're better or know how I should parent, but if you do I'll be ignoring you, my child is healthy and loving life)
Im also a new parent, and have looked at some of the research into SIDs. One of the most concerning risk factors is CO2 or CO poisoning. Because babies have such tiny lung capacity and have much less power to breath in and out as adults do, the risk of CO or CO2 becoming trapped by blankets and what have you is higher, so basically run a fan to circulate air, dont use heaters that rely on combustion without adequate ventilation, dont use heavy blankets up to their chin, no cots or beds with "solid" sides (im sure you know what i mean), and place the baby with their feet at the end of the cot or bed rather than their heas being at the top of the bed or cot.
It was a learning experience, thats for sure.
As for knowing more than any other parent, its simpler to just accept that no one knows anything, because like our parents, everything you do now will be out dated and incorrect in 30 years. People that think they know stuff because they have a baby, have never met your baby, and are grand standing to make themselves feel better.
@@samallen5057 yep, 100 hundred percent agree and yeah it was quite the learning experience 😂 but have been loving it!
fun fact some research has shown that for elementary school aged kids in particular seatbelts can actually make the schoolbus LESS safe as it adds an extra step to bus evacuation and elementary school aged kids (mostly those younger than 8) may have a difficult time unfastening the seat belts and may even need assistance from an adult or older student.
That reminds me how I told my niece to fasten her seat belt properly; and she was causing trouble trying to get rid of it. I decided to do a full stop on a totally free road, and then asked her, if it threw her towards the windshield. She conceded it did, and I explained to her, that the belt is the only thing between her, and the glass pane that might break right in her face. After this, she would fasten the belt properly.
I've just started this, but I'm listening to the part about the advantages of riding backward. When I was a kid in the early '80s, I rode an experimental school bus in the Washington DC suburbs with all the seats facing backward. We loved it, and the theory was that it was more safe since school buses don't typically have seat belts. I haven't seen any since. I'm not sure why it didn't catch on. Maybe there was too much that the bus driver couldn't see?
When my younger son was still in a full car seat, the clip that held the straps that came over his shoulders broke. (It was a hand-me-down seat.) That was a fun drive, as he decided crawling around the car would be fun. I had to stop several times to park his butt back in the seat. Duct tape to the rescue! I taped the straps so he couldn't escape and then had to cut him out of the seat. Stop-gap measure until the next payday, when I purchased a new seat.
For those of you wanting to learn how to properly install car seats, you can search for a CPST (child passenger safety technician) by googling CPST registry. They are passionate about child safety and have the newest data on what is best practice for children of all ages. Some fire departments do get a few of their employees trained and many them do care a whole lot about that function of their job but being that they have many other job funtions, no one should expect them to be the most up to date. Most CPST's charge between 20-30$/hr and it normally takes less than 2 hours to teach a parent how to properly install a seat. That being said, the second thing a CPST is going to do would be read YOUR CAR SEAT MANUAL. All of the info that you need to check for a proper installation will be there. The first thing they will do is check your seats expiration date. Do not dismiss this. It matters.
When I was growing up my parents had a 2000s ford e350 van and it had height adjustable seatbelts for the front seats and I've always wondered why I never seen this again on other vehicles seems like such an easy fix to a common problem
The School buses that I rode on did not had a nice padded back on the seat. As a matter of fact it was metal plated.
Lucky kids nowadays..
Either that or hard plastic with no padding on a metal frame.
"Note to self, favorite child goes in the middle" It almost seems like those little gems of wisdom are thrown in there just to see if we're paying attention
The rear facing seats was one reason why i hated flying in the C5A.
Everything feels just wrong.
I would absolutely throw up everywhere the entire ride if I were facing backward. If I look away from the direction I’m moving even to check my phone for more than a few seconds I get terribly car sick.
I too welcome our new lizard overlords. I'm glad to see Simon is embracing them as well 😂
Simon , excellent work . most of your vids include your own opinions , and even when i may be opposed , your style isnt provacative , but informative and alway enjoyable . this wildly variable vid , perfect example AND reaching good conclusions . We boomers had been known to survive , feet swing off a hay wagon whilst being tow by pickup truck down a new york state roadway ....
i BELIEVE your continuosly interjected ; good driving habits & more so SKILLS , being the KEY overall . rock on , bruh !!!
The problem with rear facing seats isn’t just preference, but motion sickness. Facing any direction other than forward is horrible for those who struggle with it.
Lol I remember quite pairing some kids and trying to get them to sit properly in their safety seats. So many times just pulling over and stopping the car as soon as I saw they were out. Telling them that I'm not allowed to move the car if their seat belt isn't on properly. The best is when they started telling on eachother for getting out of the seat belts 😂
2:31 that child is terrifying. Semester's almost over! I can't remember the last time I could sit and watch a Simon channel.
On the center back seat being safer:
I dated a girl who's best friend who was cut in half by the lap belt... She had some understandable issues
I don't think they make cars with only lap belts for middle seats anymore for exactly that reason...
If your product is being used improperly more often than properly, the problem isn't the users. It's the product.
I feel like ISOfix corrected a lot of user error. My kid's booster seat hooks in then we pull the strap as tight as we can. It barely wiggles
8:30 Thankyou! So many times people forget that the authors of these papers can only work with the data that is available, and not only is the data affected by multiple different variables that are often not recorded or unable to be specified, but recording of information can be inexact. Sample selection bias is a huge issue.
13:35 In other words he eventually resorted to lab testing instead of real world data. Except, as mentioned in a previous example, lab tests generally show a noticeable increase in safety using booster seats (even if, for the previously mentioned reasons, that doesn't play out well in real life). So now we have to ask how comprehensive his lab testing is and where and why his results differ from other similar lab testing (which is not an evaluation of real life results).
If you look at the injuries children actually receive in car crashes (and the dangerous stresses applied on the body in crashes), there's a huge risk of injury from seat belts positioned too high over the clavicle and impacting the neck. Logically, restraints that diminish the stresses and incorrect positioning of a seatbelt should be favoured for younger age groups. It's a hard call for parents, but for governments it's easy: demand better seatbelts from car manufacturers by law.
After moving to NY 2 years I am absolutely flabbergasted with the number of kids I've seen riding around unrestrained. Hanging out of car windows or even walking around the car while the car is driving around the city. I see this at least twice a month. I had never seen this before and it makes me angry to no end.
24:00 Nope.
Ya gotta do the loop-the-loops around the head, neck and chin areas...at least three to five loops, depending on the size of the child, and then secure all of these with a triangle knot around the child's ears and eyes.
Then, just stuff a rolled up pair of sweaty running socks in their mouth, click the tab into the anchor, and you're set.
Inventor : This should help increase safety of our children from car crash!
Kids and babies : We're about to destroy this guy's career
Here is a thought, people under say 5’5” which is a pretty big portion of the population, are endangered by airbags. This could be resolved by making auto seats raise up higher but that would cost automakers money so instead, the still required airbags have an added option to turn them off.
I owned a 1970 Chevrolet C10 and in the owners manual the described the best way to transport an infant was in a Moses Basket with the center lap belt wrapped around it 😂!
Seems I was the opposite of many children. Mom said when I couldn't buckle myself, I'd demand to always be buckled and once I could buckle myself, the car was not allowed to move an inch until I was ready.
Simon, as an old childless kinda grumpy man with no drivers licence, I will watch the video until the end because I like your content.
Suggestion for another video: people who were involved in car wrecks and got maimed and/or killed because they were riding with their legs propped upon the dashboard when the air bags went off. 😬
The best option is, of course, to just avoid ever putting your kid into a giant steel death machine designed to hurtle along at 70 mph in the first place.
To be fair, seatbelts have improved a lot over the decades
I remember riding in the back seat of my parents car as a kid and it didn't even have seat belts. My own kids were strapped down, rear facing until they were almost 4. Then it was forward facing car seats, followed by booters. They are 23 now, but I still find myself glancing at their seat belts when we get in the car, the instinct runs deep I guess.
I have tried and tried and tried and tried to get my daughter to use the safety/booster seat, but she resists quite stridently and at length. For some reason she thinks they are in appropriate for someone 26 years of age.
Bribe her with ice cream. After a year of this, she will have gained enough weight to simply bounce around the car in the event of an accident and will most certainly be safe.
The booster seats with rear and side cushioning like a bucket seat in racing have to help with side impacts as the kid is held vertical.
Rear facing car seats lead to motion sickness.
Thanks for this video! Very informative
We sat on rear facing easy chairs lashed to the bulkhead in the back of my Dad's van as a child. No seat belts, though I did tie my brother down to it with baler twine once 😂. My monsters ride up in the front these days.
It would be nice if regular car seats had a 5 point harness option.
“That’s….
…
…
… related?”
😂
Some manufacturers in some model's have built in booster seats built-in to the seats. You drop part of the seat back to reposition the belts to the correct heights.