Everyone’s constantly using their smartphones. Head to an MRT station, or the public bus. No one’s actually trying to strike up a conversation with their fellow passengers. Everyone’s looking down, at that tiny screen of theirs, fingers tapping away, or giggling off at whatever cat video their watching. Smartphones are great, they make life a whole lot easier, and we don’t know what we would do without them, but they are for sure, double-edged swords, with the potential to ruin our lives.
Smartphone Fatigue
The term smartphone addiction is a legit phrase nowadays. It’s been noticed by professionals, and observed in countless numbers of teenagers who seem to have been infected by this virus.
Usage of smartphones, is known to be capable of negatively influencing the user’s vision, which commonly leads to headaches, exhaustion, fatigue and even Asthenopia. Whilst most teenagers might see the use of smartphones as a means to unwind, its usage has been shown by countless number of researchers that it’s actually a very physically-daunting action. In fact, it puts on an absurd amount of stress on the brains of users, which leads to both tiredness and exhaustion.
Sleep Deprivation
Ironically, even though users get increasingly tired, they actually sleep less. I’m sure it has happened or is happening to you guys at the moment.
We all love texting from bed, and you’ve just shot bae a message. You wait on it for a couple of minutes, trying to wait for that read receipt, then wait for them to change the status to typing, then wait for the reply, and shoot them back a message. This cycle, really never stops until way past midnight, and you can’t stand the fatigue anymore.
That’s just one instance of addiction. We’re not even talking about Candy Crush, Pokemon Go or VainGlory for you smartphone gamers.
The constant ability for you to be connected thanks to your smartphone, be it for business, or pleasure makes you unable to cut yourself off from the external world, and get you some much-needed rest.
Attention Deficit (Short Attention Span)
We are constantly distracted. It doesn’t matter if you are a student, an employee, or a business owner. Unless you are one of the top few elite who can resist all distractions, you will find your smartphone, being a constant temptation to break you out of focus.
Every few pages you flip on your lecture notes, or every couple of lines you type on your report, will be, without a doubt, interrupted by a text message, a Snap, or a Facebook notification. Even if you aren’t distracted by someone else, you might find yourself opening up Instagram every now and then, looking at #step photos, just because you can, and just because you are bored.
It’s been shown that as concentration levels decrease, work performance does as well. The ability to focus for long periods of times are trademarks of successful people like Albert Einstein. As our attention span reaches goldfish standards, will humanity’s achievements crumble too?
Final Words
Smartphones are great, but they can either increase your productivity two-folds, or decrease it ten-folds. Just make sure you exercise some restraint. Master the tool, don’t let it master.
About the Aut
hor
A Dentist-To-Be Dabbling in Tech Journalism:
Zayne is a writer who reports for VR-Zone, Stuff Singapore and The New Paper on all things tech-related. Follow this geek on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram!
