CRITICAL ESSSAY WRITING

NAME : MONICA

NIM : 2109190029

CLASS : 2C

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IMPACT OF USING SMARTPHONE FOR STUDENTS

The Benefit of a smartphone

Smartphone is a cellular phone that is equipped with various advanced and highly
capable features such as computers (Tarigan, 2013). Smartphones have become commonplace to be
found in everyday life. Almost everyone in all circles has a smartphone, starting from children to
elderly people who are already holding this phone, because it is called a mini computer in the
form of a mobile phone, so people can access various communication, educational, social
applications by only using a smartphone. Now the existence of smartphones helps students a lot
in supporting the effectiveness of distance learning in the midst of a pandemic like this. It is not
uncommon for the assignment given by the teacher to make students have to access the internet
on a smartphone because the information they are looking for is not in a book. However, there
are also many negative impacts from using smartphones for students. This is what makes the
pros and cons between the benefits and disadvantages of using smartphones in education. The
positive and negative effects of smartphones for students are as follows:

The positive impact of smartphone

The existence of smartphones today is very beneficial for students to support the
effectiveness of learning from home during the Covid-19 pandemic conditions. There are
positive effects of smartphone use on students as follows:

First, the positive impact of using smartphone is to make communication easier. This
also applies in the world of education for smooth communication between teachers, students and
parents can also be done en masse through groups available on communication applications such
as whatapp or telegram. The process of sharing information or conducting video conferences to
do assignments can also be done anywhere and anytime with the help of a smartphone and this
can be very helpful in the learning process.

Second, is as a medium of entertainment, because smartphones have many entertainment

features and this is thought to be a medium to help students or teachers to take a break from their
boredom. Many entertainment applications can be a means of learning as well as playing for
them. For example, games that can be practiced in their lives or games that hone their memory or
numeracy skills.

Third, other positive impact is that it can increase students' knowledge, because
smartphones can help to get information on various subjects very easily, besides that
smartphones are also equipped with various educational applications which are also easier and
faster if accessing the internet using the help of a search engine like Google , web browsers or
others. In addition, students can also access information and check its complete accuracy but
must be selective in seeking information from proven and trusted sources. Woodcock et al. (2012)
stated that various area of students’ lives would change by increasing smartphone use as students
begin to utilize this device to increase their learning knowledge. Smartphones use in learning
context can further lead students to be aware of the benefits they might encounter such as are
able to learn anything at anywhere and anytime as well as encourage students to involve in
learning activities. This shows that technology able to open and increase student’s prospect
especially in their academic.

Fourth, the use of smartphones can also improve their ability to manage time because
there are many applications that can help them better organize their study time. Some of the
applications such as notes, stopwatches, calendars, alarms, and many more can be used as
reminders in setting priority scales in doing tasks. With the help of smartphones, students can
learn various aspects of life with proper time management.

The Negative Impact of smartphone

The existence of a smartphone does not only make it easy for students, but if it is not
wise in its use, it will have a negative effect as explained below:

First, Lack of prudence in using smartphones also triggers negative impacts on students.
This is very dangerous if it is not prevented before it occurs, namely, not focusing while
studying, this can really happen because smartphones can distract students when the learning
process is distracted when a notification comes in by checking text messages, playing games, or
just scrolling through social media. This really disturbs his learning concentration, and it's good
to turn off notifications to focus more on learning. Froese et al. (2012) conducted a self-report survey
to investigate students’ mobile phone activity in classes and the potential effect of the activities
on students learning performance. Alfawareh and Jusoh (2014) study revealed that students do not fully
utilize smartphones for learning motive but utilize it to make calls, taking pictures and
browsing internet. Furthermore, Hanson et al. (2011) stated that students prefer to use instant
messaging, email and web-surfing in library rather than looking into library online resources

Second, improper use of smartphones can lead to decreased academic performance.

Many students experience this because the reason is that they cannot remember or capture the
information provided during the learning process because they are distracted by their
smartphone, sometimes they forget the time when they are playing games, to anticipate this
happening while studying, I usually lock the application which I think can be a boomerang for
yourself. According to the The Times of India: Health, (2013) experts said that our memory will be reduced
and cognitive thinking will be killed when using the smartphonealthough it makes the life more
convenient and easier. People now depend much on the search engine through smartphone cause
them to become poor thinker and getting more lazy than before. Berger (2013) study shows that
students who utilize mobile phone more tend to achieve lower grades and have higher anxiety
and felt less happy than students who do not utilize mobile phone frequently.

Third, students can be at risk of experiencing addiction and can’t get away from their
smartphones, this happens because of habits ranging from waking up to going back to sleep, the
first thing they look for is a smartphone. This is so sad that the disease "Nomophobia" is
created, which is a fear that arises because someone has to part with their smartphone (Jessica, 2014).
It sounds terrible but this fear arises because of the addictive nature felt by the students, usually
anxiety that arises excessively when losing a smartphone, running out of battery or if the
smartphone is not in your hand and is not even visible to the eye, this can also happen if there is
no signal can have an impact on their learning process.

Fourth, it can increase levels of anxiety and depression because social media is a sharing
medium and usually people share their stories there, from vacation photos, culinary delights, or
other happy news. This can increase levels of anxiety and depression for other people who do not
have the opportunity to feel happy as uploaded. Study conducted on smartphone users revealed
that users that overuse smartphone experience higher level of depression, trait anxiety and
state anxiety compare to normal smartphone users (Hwang et al., 2012).
According to Kelly from University College London entitled "Social Media Use and Adolescent Mental
Health”, that if 50% of women are more at risk of experiencing depression in the use of social
media than men, it is at 35%. This happens because girls at puberty tend to be more sensitive and
pay more attention to appearance so that many students feel jealous, insecure, even cyber
bullying on social media can also increase anxiety levels and can create stress and depression
 The last negative impact of smartphone abuse for students is excessive use which can
also have the risk of disturbing the health of its users. For example disruption of eye health due
to too bright screen light and usually playing gadgets while lying down which makes it too close
to the eyes or lack of sleep due to using a smartphone until late at night. In addition, it is also
easy to access websites that students should not access. For example, pornography and not a few
cases of students who commit negative actions due to pornography addiction that can be
accessed easily through their smartphones. This is of course very risk to inhibit the growth of
brain performance, student mental health and damage the future of the Indonesian generation due
to the abuse of smartphones.

Conclusion

In conclusion, after the description above, you must be aware that the current
development has reached the revolutionary 4.0 technology, the existence of smartphones has an
impact on students, there are many positive and negative influences. As a moral and educated
student, use smartphones wisely so that the benefits are obtained get a lot and can minimize the
negative impact of smartphone use. With the existence of sophisticated technology students can
search for information quickly and can increase their knowledge and abilities, besides that
students can even see the world and change the world in their hands. Make the best use of it,
make smartphones a medium for creation, innovation, as well as a place to express ideas,
thoughts and opinions in positive terms. Anything can be done easily using a smartphone, but
still in use it must be under the supervision and guidance of parents.

References:

Tarigan. (2013).
Woodcock, B., Middleton, A., & Nortcliffe, A. (2012). Considering the Smartphone
Lerner: An investigation into student interest in the use of personal technology
to enchance their learning. Student Engagement and Experience Journal, 1(1),
1-15.
Froese, A. D., Carpenter, C. N., Inman, D. A., Schooley, J. R., Barnes, R. B., Brecht, P.
W., & Chacon, J. D. (2012). Effects of classroom cell phone use on expected and
actual learning. College Student Journal, 46(2), 323-332. Retrieved from
http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=c47a113c-266f-4e8a
9da84c55fc6c2d2f%40sessionmgr4001&hid=4106
Alfawareh, H. M., & Jusoh, S. (2014). Smartphones usage among university students:
Najran University case. International J. of Academic Research, 6(2), 321-326.
https://doi.org/0.7813/2075-4124.2014/6-2/B.48
Hanson, T. L., Drumheller, K., Mallard, J., McKee, C., & Schlegel, P. (2011). Cell
phones, text messaging
The Times of India: Health, (2013)
Berger, E. (2013). Study: Students who use cellphones more get lower grades.
Jessica. (2014). Phsycology today.
 Hwang, K. H., Yoo, Y. S., & Cho, O. H. (2012). Smartphone overuse and upper
extremity pain, anxiety, depression, and interpersonal relationships among
college students. The Journal of the Korea Contents Association, 12(10), 365-
375
Kelly. (2019). Sosial Media Use and Adolescent Mental Health, Findings From the UK
Millenium Cohort Study: University College London.

Note : ( 1529 words)