People Check Their Smartphones During the Most Bizarre Situations

It has become almost impossible to find a public place where someone is not checking his or her smartphone. This shows how people are becoming more and more dependent on smartphones. What’s even more surprising is that use of smartphones has even become a regular part of private moments. According to a recently conducted survey, people have started using these mobile devices in some of the most bizarre situations. The data collected during the survey suggest that a large number of people feel the need of checking their smartphones when having sex, inside the toilet, and at times even when a funeral is underway.

The said survey was conducted by iPass, an eminent mobile connectivity company. The survey had over 1,700 participants from Europe and the United States, each of whom had to answer a series of questions pertaining to their connectivity expectations, preferences, and habits. The data obtained showed that people have become excessively reliant on smartphones, particularly Wi-Fi. This dependence has become so intense that users have started breaking social etiquette for using these mobile devices.

Patria Hume, iPass’ chief commercial officer, stated that an individual can feel nervous before his/her first date or when making a major presentation, but these days people are becoming anxious just by thinking about a possibility that they might lose the Wi-Fi connection on their phone. This anxiousness is forcing them to forget social etiquette just for the sake of using smartphone.

The past few years have seen technology, especially smartphones, become an integral part of human lives. Today, there’s virtually no situation that can stop a person from looking at his or her phone. The survey by iPass revealed that as much as 7 percent of the participants check their mobile phones when having sex. Additionally, 72 percent and 11 percent respectively look at their phones in the toilet and when attending a funeral. What’s more, almost 65 percent of the participants stated that they become nervous if they are not connected to Wi-Fi. Many also admitted that they don’t hesitate to give up various activities and items just to have a connection.

Among the participants, as much as 61 percent said that they will not be able to live without Wi-Fi connection. Surprisingly, the percentage was higher than the percentage of people who said that they will not be able to live without junk food (42%), smoking (41%), sex (58%), drugs (31%), or alcohol (33%). Twenty-five percent of the respondents admitted that they will pick Wi-Fi connection over a shower or bath. On the other hand, as much as 19 percent were found to be ready to give up human contact for Wi-Fi.

Based on the information obtained during the survey, Ms. Hume stated that mobile professionals can’t live without Wi-Fi and think that it’s more difficult to give up Wi-Fi than other addictive habits like junk food or smoking.

This is not the first time that a study has shown how people have started to give up the pleasure of real-life social interactions for spending time on their smartphones. The year 2013 saw Harris Interactive carry out a study on mobile consumer habits. It revealed that as much as 20 percent of individuals aged between 18 and 34 years look at their smartphone when having sex. What’s more, almost 75 percent of the people participating in the study informed that they always have their phones within a 5 feet distance.

Smartphones have also been found to be one of the major causes of inattention. A study conducted on more than 7,000 teenagers in China revealed a strong correlation between inattention and cell phone usage. The said study, which was carried out in 2014, also showed that restricting daily cell phone usage below an hour increased focus in children. Another study conducted in 2015 found that spending more time on phone can cause temporary inattentional deafness. This happens because users get severely distracted by a visual stimuli i.e. their phone and fail to hear any sound, loud or mild.

Let’s come back to the habit of checking phone when having sex. During a 2016 study, a group of university researchers tested the smartphone usage habit of 221 students. One in every ten of those students admitted that they are so dependent on their smartphone that they cannot prevent themselves from checking it even during sex.

Information collected during the study couldn’t specify how those students manage to look at their phone during those intimate moments. The participants didn’t reveal whether their partner knows that they check their social media accounts and enjoy sex simultaneously. It’s also not known whether the users give updates about their sex session on their social media pages. What’s more, no one even specified how long they check their smartphone for when having sex. However, the researchers clearly stated that users tend to look at their phone when having sex and not during their post-coital hug.

According to the study, on average humans spend almost a couple of hours on their smartphone every day. Like the iPass study, this one also suggests that people are becoming more and more unmindful of social etiquettes. This has been confirmed from the study’s findings which suggest that 95 percent of the people use their phones when attending social gatherings. The study even suggests that smartphone is making people less professional. It revealed that as much as 70 percent of people check their phones when working.

The study was headed by University of Virginia’s psychology research scientist Kostadin Kushlev. He was assisted by researchers from the University of British Columbia.

When speaking about the findings of the study, Kushlev stated that just around a decade back Steve Jobs said that smartphones would change the world and that’s what we are witnessing today. Smartphones have brought internet into our pockets; we can now get notifications about text messages, emails, social media posts and updates, news irrespective of our location. Kushlev and his team carried out the study to find out how the constant flow of information and notifications is influencing human minds.

Kushlev’s study also suggested that smartphones can be responsible for causing more serious hyperactivity and inattention, which happen to be signs of ADHD. The researchers believe that the best way of fighting these issues is by reducing phone usage. This can be done either by keeping the device switched off for a specific period of time or by turning notifications off.