Are we slaves to our smartphones?
Take part in Australia's Biggest Smartphone Survey - an online project for National Science Week led by cyber-psychology expert from the University of Sydney, Dr Andrew Campbell.聽
How much time do we spend on our smartphones every day? Does it help us connect or disconnect with people? And could we live without it?
Australia鈥檚 Biggest Smartphone Survey is asking people to share how they use their smartphone and what impact this ubiquitous device is having on their life.
, an expert in cyber-psychology from the at University of Sydney says that recent studies show that we check our phones between 85 and 130 times a day - sometimes much more.
聽鈥淲e are more reliant on our smartphones than any other forms of computing technology at present, and having access to mobile devices 24/7 is having a huge impact on our lives,鈥� he said.
Last year 84 per cent of Australians owned a smartphone and among young people, that figure was 94 per cent. Even one in three children under 12 years now own a smartphone.
鈥淭he question is, are our phones improving or detracting from our quality of life?
鈥淏eing connected to a stream of news or social media may be having impact on our cognitive functioning and social behaviour across the lifespan. 聽
鈥淲e鈥檙e at risk of a growing 鈥榙igital zombie鈥� community - that is, being connected online all the time but not really living a full and healthy life that is disconnected from the digital world.
聽鈥淚n an era where FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is driving tech use, we need to understand the short and long-term effects of being connected online indefinitely.
鈥淲e must therefore recognise the pitfalls of the technology, just as much as we need to recognise its benefits.
鈥淪martphones are here to stay 鈥� the Smartphone Survey will help us learn more about how people may use them productively. In turn, this will give us information on ways we can become less obsessed with all the functions they can connect us to at any given moment like email, social media, text messages鈥�.
About the survey:
is the online national project for National Science Week 2017, undertaken by ABC Science with funding through the Australian Government鈥檚 Inspiring Australia strategy.
