Roughly one in four young adults have smartphone addiction according to research. The research also concluded that smartphone addiction is causing mental health issues to those affected.
Researchers have determined that 23 percent of children or young people have problematic or dysfunctional use of smartphones. The group was not able to function properly when phones were kept away from them.
The research also found that when these young people were limited access to their smartphones, they developed anxiety, depression, and stress.
The group was also neglecting physical activities that are beneficial to their health to use their phones. This smartphone addiction was also found to have a negative effect on the mental health of these young people.
Research on smartphone addiction
The research involved the analysis of data from 41 studies conducted from 2011 to the present. The data had researched a total of 41,871 teenagers and young people from America, Asia, and Europe.
Co-senior author Dr. Ben Carter from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Neuroscience at King’s College London indicated they were looking at negative patterns as a result of smartphone addiction. He continued by saying,
Looking at an ‘addicted’ pattern of behavior towards smartphones, we have established correlations between this type of dysfunctional behavior and poorer mental health outcomes.
The smartphone addiction problem is something that needs to be highlighted according to researchers. They argued that it is having a negative effect on the mental health of these young adults and if not addressed, it will become a crisis.
Addiction occurs also among adults
One of the authors of the study Dr. Nicola Kalk from King’s College London acknowledged that smartphones are here to stay. The author continued by saying that it is, therefore, important to understand how we can solve the smartphone addiction rather than limiting access to smartphones. More research is needed to understand how to address this problem and the impact of smartphone addiction on future generation’s mental health.
An earlier study had also revealed various smartphone addiction symptoms among young Chinese workers, and these include withdrawal, salience, conflicts, and phantom phone signals. Conscientious, neurotic, and extroverted employees are likely to exhibit these symptoms.
Contrary to the common perception that technology addiction is most common among introverted persons, four typical symptoms of smartphone addiction was observed among extroverts, namely, “withdrawal (e.g., experiencing negative feelings when having no access to smartphones), salience (e.g., constant checking and thinking about smartphones), conflict (e.g., smartphone use interferes with family and work-life), and phantom phone signals (e.g., illusory perception of a phone vibrating or ringing).”
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