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The Effects of Smartphones on Social Lives: How to minimize their use The use of the smartphone has considerably changed the way we access information and interact with people around us. This single device offers us a variety of handy options such as making a phone call, taking a photo, paying a bill, listening to music, watching a video and using the Internet. Nevertheless, the fact that these By Eleni Mathioudaki activities can be carried out anywhere has made this technology more intrusive than any other has in the past. While the smartphone has made simpler the way people maintain their interpersonal relationships and carry out daily tasks, there are experimental studies showing that people often ignore those with whom they are physically interacting, while preferring to indulge themselves in their smartphone and to connect to “online others”. This is quite easy to identify, as when you take a walk outside or go to a restaurant, you will observe that a lot of people prefer to look at their phone screen instead of interacting with the physical environment or others. But how did we get here? The first portable cell phone was invented on April 3, 1973 by Motorola engineer, Martin Cooper, who made the first ever cell phone call on the DynaTAC 8000X, by using a prototype weighing 2.4 lb (1.1 kg) and measuring 9.1 x 5.1 x 1.8 in (23 x 13 x 4.5 cm). This device offered a talk time of just 30 minutes and required 10 hours to recharge. The DynaTAC phone was priced at $3,995, which is the equivalent of $10,000 today.
• Most people, on average, spend 3 hours and 15 minutes on their phones each day. • Half of all phone pickups happen within 3 minutes of a previous one. Here are some tips that will help you spend less time on your smartphone and communicate better with others (not through screens), thus leading to a healthier life style:
1. Change notification settings in order to keep them
to a minimum: You can even turn off all notifications except for direct messages and mentions, which are the ones that come from real people.
2. Analyze your screen time and set time limits for the apps you use too much: Monitoring your usage from app to app is a great way to identify behaviours you want to change and have a general idea of the time you spend looking at a screen.
3. Grayscale: The Center for Human Technology says the "colorful icons give our brains shiny rewards every time we unlock". You can set your phone to grayscale so that you can train your mind to check your phone less.
4. Do not use your smartphone before bedtime to have
healthy sleep. It is better not to keep your smartphone within reach at night. Rather than charging it on your nightstand, try charging it further away or ideally leave it in another room. Also you can stop using your phone as an alarm clock.
5. Delete applications: This applies to social networks in
particular. If you need to, you can check your newsfeed in a browser.
6. Stay away from your phone after posting anything on
social media. It’s usually very intriguing to check your likes and comments every 5 minutes.
7. Pause for a couple of seconds before grabbing your
phone and try to analyze why you do it. Do you really need to use it or it is just a bad habit that it is hard to put an end to?
Since 1973, cell phones have evolved in their capabilities and features, and are now an essential item in the hands of almost every individual. As a result, most of us rely on our smartphones to get through our daily plans, activities, and responsibilities. Moreover, this technology has become almost the only means of communication among us, taking away the more personal conversations that we used to have prior to its invention. Nowadays, when we plan to spend time with others we actually end up spending our time together on our smartphones. The figures speak for themselves:
• The typical cell phone user touches his or her phone 2,617 times every day. 2,617 times!
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Issue 79-March 2022
8. Hide the most distracting apps on the second page of
the screen. You will be less tempted to use them. In order to strive towards a more socially active way of life, starting from next year, we will introduce the tradition of the hidden coin in the New Year’s Day cake on board the vessels and a symbolic gift will be given to the winners. This can be a chance to communicate, spend quality time with each other and have real conversations, creating memories that will be happily remembered for the years to come. Sources: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487017302520 “Journal of Economic Psychology” https://versus.com/en/news/cell-phone-history https://www.becomingminimalist.com/break-your-cell-phone-habit/ https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1590&context=ots_masters_projects https://www.pcmag.com/how-to/how-to-wean-yourself-off-smartphones-and-social-media
