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Are you Nomophobic?
Friday 12th October 2012 | Sophie
Do you obsessively check your mobile phone for texts, emails, facebook notifications, whatsapp messages and missed calls? Do you sleep with your alter-ego under your pillow and take it to the bathroom with you? Worst of the modern day social faux pas, is your little treasure kept right beside your plate on the restaurant table?
If you have answered yes to any of the above questions, along the majority of the western world, you are suffering from the modern epidemic: Nomophobia. This term refers to the the fear of being without your mobile phone: an abbreviation of “no mobile phone phobia”. The phobia was bestowed with this name in 2008 by YouGov, who surveyed two thousand members of the British public, 53% of whom admitted to being anxious when they did not have their phones. The latest survey, conducted by SecurEnvoy this year, sees this percentage rise to 66% with 41% of the people interviewed owning two phones of more. Those aged 18-24 were the most affected, with 77% incapable of staying apart from their mobile for more than a few minutes! Interestingly, whilst the 2008 study revealed men to be more affected, today it is women who suffer most.
These studies prove the extent to which people now rely on their phones. The mobile phone is no longer just an apparatus with which to communicate. These small portable devices now hold our entire lives within their four walls; our music, our photographs, our means of daily organisation. With internet browsing and apps at the touch of a button, we no longer need to plan daily tasks in advance. This makes life so much easier, and surely this can only be a good thing? But what happens when we lose signal, battery or our actual device? The anxiety we feel is an indicator of our absolute reliance on instantly accessible information. This is only going to intensify with time. Will future generations even know how to read a map?
Mobile phone technology has come a long way from the first handset in 1973, weighing in at 2.2 pounds. It is undeniably an incredible invention that benefits our lives in countless ways. Yet we have to question whether a society where having your mobile on at the dinner table, or asking for divorce via text message is a direction we want to go in. Using your phone to keep in touch, and assist your lifestyle is great but letting it disturb your sleep, ruin your relationships and strain on your finances is insanity.
Stop living vicariously. Turn your phone off for the day, or better still, leave it at home. I dare you.
Check out Scott Mills getting revenge on a mobile phone company bellow:
By Sophie Douglas
