Smartphones and Nomophobia -- Electronic Obsession

“Three billion people, around 40% of the world’s population, use online social media – and we’re spending an average of two hours every day sharing, liking, tweeting and updating on these platforms, according to some reports. That breaks down to around half a million tweets and Snapchat photos shared every minute.”

– From BBC Future’s “Best of 2018”

Everywhere I am I see so many people, at the first available minute, choosing to bury their noses into their smartphones. They begin accessing the web, texting friends and relatives, and communicating with seemingly everyone about everything. Whether at their homes, driving their cars, or at social settings, these people automatically employ their mobile digital assistants as if they are turning on their brains. They feel they must connect with their extended, electromagnetic minds and devote their attention to mobile technology. It's enough to make me wonder if anyone is living in the moment.

Statistics gathered by Pew Research Center in early 2018 found that 95% of Americans owned some type of cell phone. Of them, 77% owned a smartphone. This was a 42% increase from 2011, the first year that smartphone ownership surveys were conducted.

Additionally, 84% of Americans households had at least one smartphone and about 33% had at least three smartphones.

People fiercely believe they must have their phone with them and active all the time. Nomophobia – no–mobile-phone-phobia – is the fear of not having your phone with you. Just how real is this fear?

Consider …

• The average smartphone owner unlocks their phone 150 times a day. (Source: Internet Trends, Kleiner Perkins)
• 71% of users usually sleep with or next to their mobile phone. (Source: Huffington Post)
• 75% of users admit that they have texted at least once while driving. (Source: TrustMyPaper)

I've actually seen people freak out when they cannot get a signal. They panic and worry something will happen without their instantaneous access. Paranoid?

I've seen other users fall victim to “phantom phone alerts,” the mysterious phenomenon where they think their phone is buzzing but it isn’t. Neurotic?

According to a recent Pew Research Center study, 46 percent of Americans say they could not live without their smartphones. Hyperbole or chronic admission of dependency?

“The starry sky is absolutely gorgeous tonight. Maybe I'll see a shooting star and can make a wish … especially since I'm getting told to get off my phone.”

– April Mae Monterrosa

For so many, smartphones have become a habit which causes them to miss out on meaningful engagements in the real world. They also miss the creativity that comes in idle moments when the mind is free to wander. Spending so much time on their smartphones, some cannot find the right phone/life balance – they end up overly distracted and anxious as their excessive phone use starts to affect their mental health.

People's obsessional reliance on smartphones causes them to lose their ability to take care of themselves in an organic and all natural way. Hyung Suk Seo, M.D., professor of neuroradiology at Korea University in Seoul, South Korea, and his colleagues found that people with a so-called internet and smartphone addiction actually demonstrated imbalances in brain chemistry compared to a control group.

Another study appearing in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research found that cognitive capacity was significantly reduced whenever a smartphone was within reach, even when the phone is off.

(Maureen Morley and Linda Brooks. “Smartphone Addiction Creates Imbalance in Brain.” Radiological Society of North America. November 30, 2017.)

How about very young people and their use of smartphones?

The experts are unequivocal: Kids in this age group shouldn’t be using smartphones (or other mobile devices), period. The Canadian Paediatric Society (CPS) recommends limiting it to less than one hour a day for children ages two to five years old (screen time for children younger than two years old is not recommended at all), while the American Academy of Pediatrics advises placing consistent limits on media consumption for children ages six and older.

Michael Cheng, a child and family psychiatrist at Ottawa’s Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario, explains that mobile devices cause the brain to become wired from an early age to crave easy dopamine, referring to the “feel-good” chemical released by the brain. The constant overstimulation from mobile screens gives the brain hits of dopamine (and adrenaline), which is why they’re so addictive.

Researchers from the Boston University School of Medicine took a close look at the available literature on smartphone and iPad use among very young children. Using such devices to entertain or pacify children, they warn, might have a detrimental effect on their social and emotional development.

“If these devices become the predominant method to calm and distract young children, will they be able to develop their own internal mechanisms of self-regulation?” the researcher's question.

Hands-on activities and those involving direct human interaction are superior to interactive screen games, the experts suggest. The use of mobile devices becomes especially problematic when such devices replace hands-on activities that help develop visual-motor and sensorimotor skills.

Children spend more time with electronic media than they do in any other activity, aside from sleep. Too much screen time can be harmful to kids. One recent study found that parental monitoring of kids' media use – cutting screen time – led to improved sleep, decreased body mass index, reduced aggression, and better grades.

(Douglas A. Gentile, PhD1; Rachel A. Reimer, PhD2; Amy I. Nathanson, PhD3; et al. “Protective Effects of Parental Monitoring of Children’s Media Use.” JAMA Pediatr. 2014;168.)

Teens have been dramatically affected by smartphone use.

Smartphone ownership has expanded dramatically among teens over the past six years. According to a national “Social Media, Social Life” report by Common Sense Media (2018), less than half of teens (41 percent) had phones in 2012. Today, 89 percent of teens do. Pew Research Center (2018) found 45 per cent of these teens are online “constantly.”

Although some studies disagree, San Diego State University psychologist Jean Twenge sees a direct link between how much time teens spend on smartphones and troubling signs of mental health distress.

In her 2017 book iGen, Twenge cited national health surveys and other statistics to argue that a generation of teens have turned to smartphones as their preferred social outlet, and teens who spend the most time on their screens are more likely to be unhappy. Psychological well-being was highest in years when adolescents spent more time with their friends in person, reading print media, and on exercise and sports.

"What you get is a fundamental shift in how teens spend their leisure time," Twenge told USA TODAY. "They are spending less time sleeping, less time with their friends face to face … It is not something that happened to their parents. It is not something that happens as a world event."

And, some experts warn that this over-reliance on your mobile device for all the answers might lead to avoidance of effort. In fact, a study from researchers at the University of Waterloo published in the journal Computers in Human Behavior found that there is actually a link between relying on a smartphone and mental laziness.

"The problem with relying on the Internet too much is that you can't know you have the correct answer unless you think about it in an analytical or logical way," explained Gordon Pennycook, one of the study's co-authors

“Our research provides support for an association between heavy smartphone use and lowered intelligence,” said Pennycook. “Whether smartphones actually decrease intelligence is still an open question that requires future research.”

(Nathaniel Barr, Gordon Pennycook, Jennifer A. Stolz, Jonathan A. Fugelsang. “The brain in your pocket: Evidence that Smartphones are used to supplant thinking. Computers in Human Behavior, 2015.)

Conclusion

Smartphones offer many positive features while offering instant access to friends and to the Internet. They can be an invaluable convenience that puts a world of information at the fingertips. They're always at hand to help keep people safe and to assist them with day-to-day tasks.

However, when the device becomes a routine substitute for reality, we should understand the dangers involved with its obsessive use. With the potential to dehumanize users and to make them overly dependent on technology, smartphones can hinder human development and cripple interpersonal relationships. Like every dangerous obsession, Nomophobia can damage and even destroy its host. The “smart” in “smartphone” is critically dependent on its owner and his or her good judgment.

"The challenge for a human now is to be more interesting to another 

than his or her smartphone.”

– Alain de Botton