Smartphones are distracting. Messages or calls are constantly arriving. Children often become unfocused, hyperactive, and even obese thanks to today’s smartphone use. But the consequences of the ubiquitous smartphones are not only evident in children. Smartphones don’t exactly make adults smarter either, on the contrary: the mere presence of their own smartphone – even when it’s switched off – apparently reduces brain power, according to studies.
Smartphone episode: Lower brain power
A decline in brain power is not exactly desirable. But this is exactly the result of frequent smartphone consumption, researchers from Texas recently discovered.
On average, a smartphone owner uses his mobile phone 85 times a day and, according to Phone companies, 91 percent of the population never left the house without a smartphone in 2021. Because smartphones ensure that we can be online all the time.
Distant friends can thus participate in our lives and we can participate in theirs; we are always very close to the pulse of time, don’t miss any news, check the weather, calculate today’s calorie requirements, buy stocks and clothes, look for suitable bed or life partners and locate the vagabond house cat. Offline has become an impossibility!
Ten years ago, no one could have imagined this permanent online state, but today it has become not only indispensable for many people. They are no longer viable without smartphones and the Internet, which, in 2015, applied to at least 46 percent of smartphone users (according to their own statement) and today is estimated to be 85%.
Frequent smartphone consequence: complaints of the musculoskeletal system
Smartphones seem very practical at first glance because they help enormously to organize life and save time. However, we have less time today than ever before, so this supposed advantage may not even come into play, as the time gained is quickly filled with other apps.
However, the massive use of smartphones also has clear health disadvantages. On June 21, 2017, for example, the journal Muscle & Nerve reported that frequent wiping movements, excessive use of the thumb and the typical flexion of the wrist can trigger carpal tunnel syndrome. The so-called cell phone neck is also widespread.
No wonder frequent users of smartphones are much more likely to have musculoskeletal complaints than infrequent users. While more than half of the frequent users examined complained of corresponding problems in an earlier study (245 out of 451 students), only 6 out of 49 students among the infrequent users did, the medical journal reported on June 23, 2017 (4).
But that’s not the only problem. This is because smartphones also reduce the performance of the brain.
Smartphone influences the ability to concentrate
Professor Adrian Ward of the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin conducted various experiments with nearly 800 smartphone users (1). It was the first study to determine how well tasks can be completed when the smartphone is nearby, even if it is not switched on or muted.
In one experiment, the participants were asked to complete various test series on the computer. The tests required full concentration in order to be able to complete them with good results.
The aim was to measure the participants’ instantly available cognitive abilities, i.e. the brain’s ability to memorize and process data in a given time.
Before the start of the test, the participants were assigned to different groups. One should put her smartphone on the table – with the display facing down. The others should put it in their pockets and a third group should put it in another room. All participants should mute their smartphones.
Higher brain power when the smartphone is in another room
During the study, it was noted that participants who kept their smartphones in a separate room performed notably better than those who didn’t in the test tasks. The difference was particularly strong compared to the participants who had their smartphones on the table. It was a little less conspicuous compared to the participants who had their smartphones in their pockets.
These results suggest that the mere presence of the smartphone reduces available cognitive performance and impairs cognitive function, even in people who believe they are giving their full attention to the task at hand.
Smartphone nearby: brain power dwindles
“The closer the smartphone was to the owner, the more the cognitive abilities of the people decreased,” Professor Ward explained. “Your consciousness doesn’t think about the smartphone, but the very fact that you make an effort not to think about the smartphone consumes some of your limited cognitive resources and thus causes a kind of brain power loss.”
In another experiment, the researchers examined the participants’ smartphone addiction. They wanted to find out how the feeling of needing a smartphone to get through the day affects cognitive performance.
The participants were asked to go through the same test series on the computer as the groups of the first experiment. Here, too, some of the participants had their smartphone on the table (this time with the display facing up), another part put it in their pockets and still another put it in another room. Some of the participants were asked to turn off their smartphones.
Smartphone addiction: Worst brain performance
It turned out that the participants who were most addicted to smartphones solved the tasks the worst. However, this bad influence of the smartphone only came into play when they had the phone on the table or in their pocket.
Ward and colleagues also found that it didn’t matter whether a person had turned the smartphone on or off, or whether it was on the table with the display facing up or down. It was enough to have the smartphone within sight or within easy reach to reduce the person’s ability to concentrate and also their ability to cope with tasks, as part of their brain was constantly busy with the thought of not paying attention to the smartphone.
“So it’s not the distraction of the smartphone, say, by incoming messages,” Ward said. “The mere presence of the smartphone is enough to throttle the performance of the brain.”
So what can you do about it?
Take a conscious break from your phone. Turn it off at night or at least have it in another room. Maybe even go on a short holiday without your phone. Keeping your brain active and healthy certainly does not require a phone. But it does require you to take time off, stress less, and feed your brain with the right foods and herbs.
Go and smell the Roses, have a colonic, and enjoy the feeling you get from a clear head.