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It would some obvious to most people that talking on a cell phone while driving is not safe, but what goes on in the brain when you are double tasking is not so obvious.

A recent study that was performed by researchers at the University of South Carolina psychology department and which was printed in the journal, Experimental Psychology, offers a better understanding of how talking and listening, such as on a cell phone, can interfere with visual tasks, like driving.

Dr. Amit Almor who is an associate professor of psychology, reports two different experiments, in which he found that planning on what to speak and actually speaking place much more demand on the brain's resources than simply listening.

He reports that subjects preparing to speak or speaking were four times more distracted than when they were only listening. He explained that when only listening, people are able to tune in or out as needed.

The experiment consisted of detecting visual shapes on a monitor. A second experiment required that participants use a computer mouse for tracking a fast-moving target on the screen. Participants in both experiments carried out visual tasks and at the some time listened to prerecorded narratives while responding to the narratives.

According to Almor, his findings are very valid and probably even more valid in actual, interactive conversation. Working along with graduate student Tim Boiteau, a graduate student in linguistics, Almor repeated the experiment employing 20 different pairs of friends who carried out real conversation while at the same time carrying out visual tasks. The final results are being compiled this summer.

Almor says the he anticipates that effect will be even stronger and more dynamic since, in conversation, people experience the urge to contribute, and that in conversations we compete with the other person. He believes that the more the urge to speak, the greater the distraction.

Almor placed his participants in a circular, surround-sound environment where the speakers were hidden with the voice shifting from the front, rear or either side.

According to Almor's findings, that participants were able to complete the visual task in front of them with greater ease when the voice they were hearing was also to their front. Although this is not as strong as the effect of preparing to speak or speaking and listening, it does suggest that simultaneously exercising a language task and at the same time a visual task, is made easier when the tasks are in the same space both physically and cognitively.