Although it may seem exaggerated, there are many people with cell phones who are suffering from physical and psychological problems such as anxiety, palpitations and feel as if the world is ending when they forget about it, run out of coverage, run out of battery or when a platform they are involved with crashes.
It is clear that there are many advantages with the cell phone, for example, to call home, when I notice that I'm going to be late, to warn of any unexpected event. But many users have to start thinking about whether they are becoming truly "mobile-dependent", not being able to spend a single minute without their phone.
Many will wonder what is mobile addiction or what is it all about, let me share with you my research and we should really be more attentive to the signs that we give or give the people who are one step away from being addicted to cell phones.
What is mobile addiction?
Mobile has become important in our lives, for all that they offer, social networking apps, streaming, gaming and more, it can be a slippery slope.
Mobile addiction is not an official and medically accepted diagnosis, mainly due to the lack of research on the subject. However, there are criteria used by experts to describe behaviors, feelings and thoughts that indicate a lack of control over phone use. Among them, phone use interferes with commitments and relationships; lack of access to the phone causes dread, anxiety or irritability; and the ability to think deeply or creatively is hindered.
Is the cell phone all-important in our lives?
Cell phone use becomes an addiction when it becomes a repetitive behavior. It has been seen to occur in other types of addictions and to give us pleasure. It has come to be called "Telefonitis" and it is something that cannot be controlled from using the phone over and over again during the day or night. For the first time, we are beginning to talk about new technologies becoming part of the so-called psychological addictions or addictions without drugs.
According to experts, mobile addiction is suffered by 1 out of every 1,000 people who use cell phones, and they say that it is affecting mainly young people and teenagers. It is for this reason that it is important for each and every one of you to know what mobile addiction is, and to know the answers to avoid it.
Unlike other addictions, such as alcoholism or gambling addiction (compulsive gambling), etc. the age at which it starts is very low, from eleven or twelve years old, because it is very easy to have a cell phone, there are even cell phones especially for children with drawings for them, and also parents feel safe that their child has a cell phone to call in case of any emergency.
The problem begins when it is abused
An irrepressible, uncontrollable and exaggerated behavior that makes us leave other activities, such as reading, face-to-face conversation with our family, friends, neighbors. Teenagers, the great protagonists, a population especially affected by this addiction are the Adolescents. The idea of "leisure and free time" seems to be linked to the cell phone.
How cell phone addiction is generated
For a person to become addicted, it is enough to be a person who has emotional problems, with difficulties to speak, or who is in a difficult period of his life, as is the case of adolescence in which it is especially vulnerable to the many claims of youth, often are not true, such as, for example, that it is fashionable to lose weight, get attached to video games, buy products, how not, to have the latest model of cell phone as soon as possible.
All this will make a large number of people fall victims of mobile dependence and therefore become addicted. And then, the addiction will make the person deviate from their family environment, their friends, reaching a great emotional suffering.
Factors to Identify Cell Phone Addiction
1. The cell phone everywhere: when the person cannot separate from the cell phone even to go to the bathroom, classes, or family gatherings.
2. Attitude of discomfort: When the person feels annoyed if he/she forgets the cell phone somewhere or lacks money or credit to keep it working.
3. Changes in habits: When you change sleeping habits by talking late at night.
4. He disconnects from the "real world": His world is communication through the cell phone, but there is a total distance from the people around him, whether it is his family, work or school.
5. He is an expert: His anxiety to call or receive messages and have the latest technology creates a feeling that he has become an "expert" on the device.
6. The cell phone bill: When the payment of cards or bills exceeds the monthly expense budgeted for this service.
7. Criminal attitude: He/she commits some thefts to be able to buy a phone or pay the rent of the cell phone.
And to conclude I will mention some ways to combat cell phone addiction:
1. Monitor cell phone usage: the first step is to be aware of cell phone addiction is to see how much time is spent on the cell phone. The best way to do this is to keep a record of how many times you pick up the cell phone and the hours you use it.
2. Turn off notifications or silence the phone: sometimes cell phone addiction is generated because every time we hear a notification, we can not help but look. It generates an obsession to know what has just arrived. We recommend that you turn off all sounds and vibrations, or at least do it with the least relevant to you.
3. Gray screen: many times we look at the cell phone because we have the reflex that we have received a new message or notification, but the truth is that the bright colors and the reflection of the screen give this false illusion. This is why it is recommended that to control the addiction to the cell phone set your screen to grayscale, as it is proven that it helps to do without the cell phone for much longer.
4. Leave the cell phone on airplane mode when you go to sleep: Another of the big concerns around the use of the phone is that it makes it difficult to rest at night. Normally people tend to look at their cell phone before and after sleeping, and some people even wake up in the middle of the night and check their notifications.
5. Eliminate social networks: as strange as it may seem, some years ago we had to wait until we got home to check the activity of our contacts. But now that we have all the social networks on our cell phones and we are constantly checking them, we have become obsessed with constantly refreshing to see what's new, when the truth is that we have already seen everything. Deleting the networks will make us go to the search engine every time we want to check them, which would make the task more difficult and tedious, and therefore decrease its use.
6. Use a classic watch: although it may seem exaggerated, the simple fact of checking the time, most of the time, leads people to end up spending up to 10 minutes more than planned on the cell phone. To control cell phone addiction, we suggest using a wristwatch and alarm clock, so that these tasks are autonomous from the cell phone.
Your opinions are very valuable to me, I will be very attentive to your comments. Thank you for investing your valuable time reading my publication; best regards.
P.S: I want to let you know that English is not my native language, for that reason it is very likely that I may make some mistakes in the elaboration of this article. If this should happen, please feel free to correct me properly. It will help me in my learning process.
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