Eli Blackwell

Mrs. Cramer

College Comp Pd. 2

12 May 2022

Phone Dependency

These recent years, smartphones have become a habitual part of our daily lives. They

dominate our lives and interests. Social media is increasing in users daily, and it is easy to get

caught scrolling for hours. The experience of boredom, loneliness, availability of privacy, ease of

internet access, and minimal presence of parental supervision are factors that likely escalate the

excessive use of the internet. The more time we spend on our phones and depend on them, the

more chance it can have a negative impact on someone. Phone dependency can lead to an

addiction, and it is becoming a bigger issue in society because of their increased availability and

functionality.

A study was run to explore the symptoms of smartphone addiction among working adults

in China. Thirty-two workers were interviewed face to face or via Skype. All thirty-two

participants were recruited from different industrial sectors and job types. All of them considered

the smartphone to be an indispensable tool. The interview that was conducted covered three

major parts: (1) smartphone addiction symptoms, (2) psychological factors that affect addiction

symptoms, and (3) demographics. Only young working adults were examined, so the results

could vary with age. Four typical symptoms of smartphone addiction were identified during this

study. These symptoms were withdrawal, salience, conflict, and phantom phone signals.

Withdrawal causes negative feelings when a person has no access to smartphones. Salience
causes people to constantly check and think about their mobile devices. Conflict is when

smartphones begin to interfere with family and work life. Lastly, phantom phone signals are an

illusory perception of a phone vibrating or ringing. Conscientiousness, neuroticism, and

extroversion can all increase the likelihood of smartphone addiction. Conscientious workers

being more likely to develop addiction contradicts the majority of existing studies on

technological addiction. (Li and Lin)

On the topic of young adults and the mental problems they are facing, another test was

run to assess the relationship between mobile phone dependence and depression. All the data was

collected using the standardized pretested semi-structured questionnaire. The cross-sectional

study was conducted over the course of five months. Late adolescents and early adults were

selected. Among the seven hundred participants, most of them were actively using a mobile

phone. According to the results, a little less than half of them had mild mobile dependence. Only

four-point four percent ended up having a severe dependency. Six percent of all participants had

extreme or severe depression. The results showed there was no significant association between

mobile dependency and depression. (Ramaiah et al)

Smartphone addiction does not just affect one’s mental health and lifestyle. One part of

smartphone addiction people overlook often is the physical impact it has on you. An eight-

segment study was run on four hundred and two participants. These segments included the

analysis of demographic details, habituation, anxious behavior, and health issues. The average

age of the participants was twenty-three. The results showed most of the students developed a

dependency on their smartphone usage but were aware of the psychological and physical dangers

that it brings. One-fourth of the participants said they have wrist and hand pain. This pain is

usually the most common pain one will experience with some dependency. Though the
participants did not seem to have any serious pain resulting from smartphone addiction, there are

many different psychological and physical symptoms one can experience. Some of these

symptoms include dryness in the eyes, computer vision syndrome, weakness of thumb and wrist,

neck pain and rigidity, increased frequency of De Quervain's tenosynovitis, tactile hallucinations,

nomophobia, insecurity, delusions, auditory sleep disturbances, insomnia, hallucinations, lower

self-confidence, and mobile phone addiction disorders. Cellphones may expose you to EMR,

which leads to discomfort in the ears. Forty-six-point-two percent were aware of this, while fifty-

three percent were experiencing discomfort in the ears. Many of the students also agreed that

their mobile phone usage was disrupting their sleep and causes fatigue. The behavioral analysis

segment revealed seventy percent of the participants use their smartphones longer than they

intended. (Parasuraman et al)

Cellphones are widely known to be frowned upon in schools. Teachers think they are

distracting and noisy, so they usually tell students to put them away or straight-up take them

away. A British university tested just how bad phones are in schools. This study researched three

hundred and thirty-one teens, ages fourteen to sixteen, for nine months in five schools. The

teachers in these schools incorporated smartphones into their lesson plans. The students would

use their smartphones to enhance class projects, study for tests, create short movies, set

homework reminders, record their teachers’ readings of poems, access relevant Web sites,

transfer files between school and home, and communicate better with their teachers. There are

plenty of uses for smartphones within the school, and if teachers truly embrace them, they could

maximize their teachings if enforced correctly. This is not the most important change the world

needs nowadays, but it is an example of how smartphones are not all bad. As long as someone

monitors how much time they spend on them and depend on using it. Many of the students were
surprised how useful the phones were in assisting them with schoolwork. It made them enjoy

working and feel more motivated. (Docksai)

In conclusion, smartphones are increasingly taking over our day to day lives. The more

time we spend on these mobile devices, the risk of addiction increases, and you may experience

symptoms. If we can regulate how much we use our phones, then phones can still be a valuable

part of our lives. Many of us can admit we use them longer than we intend to. It is too easy to get

caught scrolling through social media for hours. We depend on our phones too much without

knowing it.
 Works Cited

Docksai, Rick. "Teens and Cell Phones: Cell Phones Can Be Noisy and Distracting. but They

Can Also Be an Aid to Learning." The Futurist, vol. 43, no. 1, Jan.-Feb. 2009, p. 10+.

Gale Academic OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A191218435/AONE?

u=pl1949&sid=bookmark-AONE&xid=c3599f46. Accessed 11 May 2022.

Li, Li, and Trisha T. c. Lin. "Over-connected? A Qualitative Exploration of Smartphone

Addiction among Working Adults in China." BMC Psychiatry, vol. 19, no. 1, 18 June

2019. Gale Academic OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A590774645/AONE?

u=pl1949&sid=bookmark-AONE&xid=1149c736. Accessed 11 May 2022.

Parasuraman, Subramani, et al. "Smartphone Usage and Increased Risk of Mobile Phone

Addiction: A Concurrent Study." International Journal of Pharmaceutical Investigation,

vol. 7, no. 3, July/September 2017, p. 125. Gale Academic OneFile,

link.gale.com/apps/doc/A511449348/AONE?u=pl1949&sid=bookmark-

AONE&xid=5bd6ae9c. Accessed 11 May 2022.

Ramaiah, Narayana Mysore, et al. "Mobile Dependency: Factors Influencing It and Its

Association with Depression among Adolescents." Journal of Mental Health and Human

Behaviour, vol. 25, no. 1, January/June 2020, p. 39. Gale Academic OneFile,

link.gale.com/apps/doc/A638144195/AONE?u=pl1949&sid=bookmark-

AONE&xid=dec0e261. Accessed 11 May 2022.