People who have the habit of texting   while walking tend to develop a robot-like posture, lose their balance, and involve themselves in traffic accidents, according to a research from the University of Queensland. Researchers said that text-walkers are in danger of walking into traffic and train tracks among others. They suggest pedestrians stop aside, type a text and then continue walking. For the study, the researchers tracked body movements of 26 young men and women while walking in a straight line over a distance of about 8.5 m ---once without a mobile phone, once while reading a text message and once while typing a message. They found that participants' body movements were greatly changed when they used their phone. The difference in their posture was more _ while sending a text than while reading a message. They further said that when those people began texting while walking, they slowed down their pace, went off course and moved their necks less than when reading a message. "We found that they 'locking' their arms, trunk and head together walked with a posture that was robot-like, all in aid of keeping their phone in their field of vision. So there is less movement between each of their body parts." Researcher Siobhan Schabrun said, Daily Mail UK reports. "In recent years, there have been many reports of people involved in traffic accidents because they were texting while walking. The number of pedestrian accidents is rising and texting has been blamed," Schabrun said. Despite such repeated accidents, only few studies have analyzed the impact of texting on body language. If more studies concentrate on walking styles adopted while texting, their findings can be used to lower whole accidents. While a few U.S. states have introduced laws on texting while driving, Fort Lee, a New Jersey town, went further ahead and recently fined some walkers an $85 for catching them texting. It is hoped that other American states and countries will follow. When texting, the pedestrians walk in a different way to   _  .
avoid losing their balance attract other people's attention keep their eyes steady on the phone take part in the study with the researchers