Teaching smoke alarms to speak

"Johnny! Johnny! Wake up! Get out of bed! Leave the room!"

Smoke alarms equipped with this personalized recording of a worried mother's voice were significantly better at waking up children in a deep sleep and enabling them to perform a simulated escape procedure than standard residential tone alarms, a new study found.

"The bad news is that the study confirms early reports that children do not respond adequately to conventional residential smoke alarms," said study author Dr. Gary A. Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Children's Hospital, in Columbus, Ohio.

"The good news is that the study showed children do respond to their parent's voice smoke alarm," he added.

Full article here. I am curious how much a difference it makes whether the voice is a child's own mother; how much less effective would another woman's voice be -- or is it possible that it might be more effective? Sometimes kids heed their teachers more than their parents, so why not try a teacher's voice, too? And, of course, what about the voice of the father?

Posted by David on October 3, 2006 11:19 AM