Credit: iStock/Minerva Studio
The average smartphone user checks their phone a whopping 110 times a day. This thought echoed through my mind as I was eating breakfast in my apartment the other morning, the smooth sounds of Lionel Richie permeating the air, my trusty phone in hand. I was texting, sipping my one percent milk, eating, talking to my girlfriend, and listening to "All Night Long" simultaneously -- like a goddamn circus juggler -- when disaster struck: my hand slipped, dropping my treasured phone right into my half-full glass.
This had to be a sign. My excessive iPhone use was becoming a problem I needed to solve. I began my quest for knowledge to rid myself of this seemingly out of control addiction, and what I found are these important, everyday tips to help kick the Cupertino Crack™. Hopefully, this list helps you as much as it has helped me.
1. Never use your phone as your alarm clock
We all know how it goes: once you're done dealing your standard wave of 20 snoozes, you flick off the alarm, and go straight to browsing: Instagram, email, videos of baby elephants -- you've already bogged yourself down with a tech overload before your feet hit the floor. If you want to distance yourself from your tech in a meaningful way, you need to nip the problem in the drowsy bud. And since so many of us literally wake up with our phone in our hands, this is the first place to start cutting back.
2. Stop checking your emails before work
This kind of goes hand-in-hand with the previous submission--and it's admittedly a doozy. I am as guilty of this as anyone, as I immediately check my email when I get out of bed (even before I get out of bed, in most cases). But honestly, after trying this out for a few days, I noticed nothing had changed at all. I got to my morning emails, what--an hour and a half later? Unless you're the CEO of your company or a neurosurgeon on call, you can probably afford to wait till 9am to get back to someone. In fact, some countries have made off-hour work emails a criminal offense. Seriously.
3. Remove those excess apps
Having instant 'round the clock access to Facebook is as superfluous as a nipple on my elbow. As a wise man on the Internet once said, Facebook is like the fridge--you check it every 15 minutes, even though you know nothing's there. By eliminating time-wasters and attention suckers, you can rid yourself of the urge to draw your smartphone from your pocket every three minutes out of pure impulse.
4. Actually, don't bring your phone into the bedroom at all
If you're having trouble keeping your paws off your screens in the AM, start by cutting yourself off at night. Leaving your phone out of the boudoir not only gives you another clearly defined tech-free time/zone, it makes sure the unnatural light doesn't mess with your circadian rhythm, leading to better sleep. Keep your bedroom a sanctuary. After all, it is where the magic happens (according to MTV Cribs, which would never lie to me).
5. Turn off (or customize) notifications
You don't need an obtrusive bleep or buzz every time your bar mitzvah #TBT gets some love. It only makes you more apt to whip out your phone and get nose-deep in a vicious tech circle of texting, email checking, and lord knows what else. You can disable in-app notifications in your main settings menu (under the App section), or customize them for only the important stuff. As far as calls and texts go, one viable solution I've been using is setting custom vibrations for certain people. So, I can tell if it's someone important (like my girlfriend, or the neighborhood dog catcher) without taking my phone out of my pocket. You can make your own custom vibes by selecting a contact, then the "Vibration" option, underneath "Ringtone."
6. Airplane mode will set you free
This is another answer for people too scared to leave their phones behind completely. Basically, you'll be left with just a combination clock/camera. If you really want to focus on a task at hand, or just need to make sure no one bothers you for an extended period, just switch on airplane mode, and let it ride. Try doing this while you're driving, in social situations, or watching TV, and gradually extend your "Airplane time" to other activities. It's all about conditioning yourself to a life less cluttered with phone time, and Airplane mode is an excellent stepping stone on your way to mindfulness.
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Studies About Kids And Technology
Open Image ModalSource: Common Sense MediaGist: "While longitudinal research does allow us to speak in terms of a 'causal' relationship, it is probably more accurate and useful to think about media violence as a 'risk factor' rather than a 'cause' of violence — one variable among many that increases the risk of violent behavior among some children." (credit:Alamy)
January 2013: Screen Time Not Linked To Kids' Physical Activity(03 of18)
Open Image ModalOpen Image ModalSource: FacebookGist: "We investigated anonymized and automatically processed posts and comments by people self-identified as parents and children to understand how conversation patterns with each other might be a bit different from those with their other friends." (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: Pew Research CenterGist: "Most parents of teenagers are concerned about what their teenage children do online and how their behavior could be monitored by others. Some parents are taking steps to observe, discuss, and check up on their children’s digital footprints." (credit:Shutterstock)
Open Image ModalSource: C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's HealthGist: "In this Poll, nearly two out of three adults expressed strong support for proposed COPPA updates, including requiring apps designed for kids to confirm that users are at least 13 and prohibiting apps from collecting personal information from users under age 13." (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: Family Online Safety InstituteGist: "These surveys indicate that teens’ concerns about their online safety parallel parents’ concerns more closely than parents realize and that many teens are taking steps to protect their privacy and personal information. Nonetheless, teens suggest that parents are not as informed about what their teens do online as parents think they are, and some teens are taking risks by providing personal information to strangers online." (credit:Shutterstock)
Open Image ModalSource: Common Sense MediaGist: "America’s teachers -- whether they are long-time classroom veterans or young, tech-savvy ones, at wealthy schools or low-income schools, public or private, elementary or high school -- surface relatively consistent concerns: Students are having issues with their attention span, writing, and face-to-face communication, and, in the experience of teachers, children’s media use is contributing to the problem. On the plus side, teachers find that young people’s facility with media is helping them find information quickly and multitask more effectively." (credit:Shutterstock)
Open Image ModalSource: Common Sense MediaGist: "Three out of four teens have social networking sites, and half of all teens are on their sites on a daily basis. But despite our concerns about social media, in the vast majority of cases, these media do not appear to be causing great tumult in teenagers’ lives." (credit:Shutterstock)
Open Image ModalSource: Pew Research CenterGist: “The volume of texting among teens has risen from 50 texts a day in 2009 to 60 texts for the median teen text user. The frequency of teens' phone chatter with friends - on cell phones and landlines - has fallen. But the heaviest texters are also the heaviest talkers with their friends.” (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: PediatricsGist: "There was no evidence that children receiving the active video games were more active in general, or at anytime, than children receiving the inactive video games." (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: PediatricsGist: “This updated policy statement provides further evidence that media—both foreground and background—have potentially negative effects and no known positive effects for children younger than 2 years. Thus, the AAP reaffirms its recommendation to discourage media use in this age group. This statement also discourages the use of background television intended for adults when a young child is in the room.” (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: Common Sense MediaGist: "Nine-month-olds spend nearly an hour a day watching television or DVDs, 5-year-olds are begging to play with their parents’ iPhones, and 7-year-olds are sitting down in front of a computer several times a week to play games, do homework, or check out how their avatars are doing in their favorite virtual worlds. Television is still as popular as ever, but reading may be beginning to trend downward. Having an accurate understanding of the role of media in children’s lives is essential for all of those concerned about promoting healthy child development: parents, educators, pediatricians, public health advocates, and policymakers, to name just a few." (credit:Shutterstock)
Open Image ModalSource: The Huffington PostGist: “[E]xperts have some serious concerns regarding the methods and conclusions of the first study evaluating the connection between cell phone radiation and brain cancer in children and teens. Not only was the study flawed, they note, but it was also financially supported by the cell phone industry.” (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: PediatricsGist: “This study found that greater television and computer use was related to greater psychological difficulties, independent of gender, age, level of deprivation, pubertal status, and objectively measured physical activity andsedentary time.” (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: PediatricsGist: "Viewing television and playing video games each are associated with increased subsequent attention problems in childhood. It seems that a similar association among television, video games, and attention problems exists in late adolescence and early adulthood." (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: Pew Research CenterGist: “Fully two-thirds of teen texters say they are more likely to use their cell phones to text their friends than talk to them to them by cell phone.” (credit:Alamy)
Open Image ModalSource: Kaiser Family FoundationGist: “Today, 8-18 year-olds devote an average of 7 hours and 38 minutes (7:38) to using entertainment media across a typical day (more than 53 hours a week). And because they spend so much of that time ‘media multitasking’ (using more than one medium at a time), they actually manage to pack a total of 10 hours and 45 minutes (10:45) worth of media content into those 7½ hours.” (credit:Shutterstock)
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