PDAs and Smartphones have apparently become an indispensable part of peoples' daily lives and society, keeping many abreast and aware of minute-to-minute breaking news, weather systems, even changes in marital status of celebrities and so on.
An aspect of this convenience in enabling people to remain connected, is the ever-present alerts, pings and rings that identify an incoming text, chat message, email or breaking news story.
However, the end result of the constant dopamine stimulation from these devices leaves people addicted and curious, as well as being unable to disregard incoming texts and emails.
As technology continues to tighten its grip on our lives, the price for staying connected means that we lose the “human” connecting our voices, touch, and facial expressions. So, when we reach for our smartphones, and think we are staying connected, we are actually drifting apart.
The outcome of this electronic urge leads to a preoccupation with, and need to reinforce this electronic high. And the adverse effects in search of this connection can have serious implications for the mental health of college students.
This is the premise of a new paper published online in the journal, NeuroRegulation, in which San Francisco State researchers studied the smartphone habits and usage of 135 students enrolled at the University.
Erik Peper, Professor of Health Education, and Richard Harvey, Associate Professor of Health Education, propose that excessive use of smart phones bears striking similarities to those diagnosed with substance abuse.
Their conclusion is simple: the heaviest smartphone users exhibited the greatest degree of depression, anxiety, loneliness, and isolation.
"The behavioral addiction of smartphone use begins forming neurological connections in the brain in ways similar to how opioid addiction is experienced by people taking Oxycontin for pain relief gradually," explained Peper in a news release.
The researchers concluded that being addicted to the technology powering social media may actually have an adverse effect on nurturing and developing new social connections.
The researchers believe that Loneliness, stems from the absence of body language and other social cues normally associated with face-to-face communication.
The issue is that visual signals can't be interpreted when people use texting as form of communication.
The researchers also pointed out that these same students also repeatedly multitasked while studying, eating, attending class, or while engaged watching other forms of media. This incessant level of activity, they explain, doesn’t allow you to physically or mentally decompress and relax.
This leads to a phenomenon known as "semi-tasking," in which people are engaged in 2 or more tasks simultaneously. In other words, its hard to perform both tasks well, so that the quality of one unfortunately suffers.
But just as we can practice restraint such as cutting down caloric intake we can also make a conscious effort to reduce our addiction to smartphones and tablets.
By acknowledging that tech companies are essentially tinkering with our biological responses to incoming danger, we can reclaim control by turning off push notifications, and only answer texts and emails during specific times of the day.
We need to devote time to ourselves, nourish our brains and engage in exercise as an antidote to smartphone addiction. Reconnecting with nature, taking time to look at our surroundings instead of burying our heads in our phones is a step in the right direction.
