Phone addiction?

[Mrs McCarthy]

I suspect I may have a phone addiction. I spend about 3 hours on my phone. Half of it is the usual - social media, tattle, that kind of stuff. I also watch YouTube videos whilst I cook, so that’s another 30-40 minutes on my IPad. However the other half is reading and that’s my main problem.
A lot of advice on phone addiction suggests reading an ordinary book without having your phone near you. I prefer reading on my phone - the ebooks are cheaper than normal books. Also English is my second language and in iBooks I can very quickly look up unknown words. I have tried reading an ordinary book with a dictionary next to me, but I get more frustrated. If I read an ordinary book with my phone, I look it up on Google and get distracted Don’t like ebooks for the same reasons, the ones I had didn’t let me to look up words easily.
Should I even worry or is that fairly normal phone usage?

 

[JD-Morgan]

I get a notification every Monday on my iPhone with my weekly usage

The usage is normally 6-7 hours a day just now as I'm working from home so use my phone more than I do compared to when I'm in the office

I don't believe you can be on your phone 'too much', I don't pay £50 a month to hardly use it

 

[Mrs McCarthy]

I get a notification every Monday on my iPhone with my weekly usage

The usage is normally 6-7 hours a day just now as I'm working from home so use my phone more than I do compared to when I'm in the office

I don't believe you can be on your phone 'too much', I don't pay £50 a month to hardly use it

Mine isn’t on a contract, so I don’t pay for it, which probably why it makes me feel bad about using it

 

[silkytoes]

I don't think 3 hours is that bad at all, especially if you're using it to read as well - I don't see why reading on your phone is worse necessarily than reading an actual book.

I mostly read physical books but do sometimes switch to ebooks on a tablet/ereader or on my phone.

I think there is such a thing as spending too much time on your phone, but I think this is when you're neglecting your life and the people around you to look at it.

Funny timing - I challenged my boyfriend to spend 24 hours without looking at twitter last night as a joke but he decided to do it and uninstalled the app from his phone. I was getting frustrated because we would go out for dinner or be lying in bed and I'd be trying to talk to him and he'd be staring at twitter instead. It's particularly embarrassing in public. I want him to break the habit of always checking twitter every time he sits down.

 

[Belulah]

I feel I use mine too much but I spent many years living alone so I always had podcasts going for company. I work full time and do not go on it at all during work. But the other day my daughter tried to get my attention and I was distracted by my phone. That made me feel awful.

 

[Morequeries]

My parter seems to spend more attention to their phone then whats going on around them

 

[Mulholland Drive]

Mine is a company phone on contract, so I never bother monitoring usage. But if pushed I'd say maybe 2-3 hours per day

 

[Lulu Goss]

Funny timing - I challenged my boyfriend to spend 24 hours without looking at twitter last night as a joke but he decided to do it and uninstalled the app from his phone. I was getting frustrated because we would go out for dinner or be lying in bed and I'd be trying to talk to him and he'd be staring at twitter instead. It's particularly embarrassing in public. I want him to break the habit of always checking twitter every time he sits down.

I might see if I can get my boyfriend to agree to the same. We both use our phones a lot, but I’d say he is way more “addicted” to his. Sometimes we’ll be watching something together and I’ll look over and realise he’s not watching it at all. Same thing with going to bed too, he’ll get in bed and start scrolling Instagram/Twitter - he’ll be on it when I fall asleep and sometimes I’ve woken up randomly an hour or so later and he’s STILL on it!

I completely feel your pain. He’s not even looking at anything in particular on it, usually scrolling through random football conversation. Feel like I’m out with a teenager at the shops sometimes with him trailing along behind me staring at his phone

 

[SkinnyTurkeyDinosaur]

I used to spend a ridiculous amount of time reading here cut down a lot though still pop on now and again, but yeah my phone was at 8 hours a day loads in lockdown. I don't really go on it when I'm with other people though unless there's a message I have to reply to but I wouldn't say 3 hours is too bad neither x

 

[GetOffMyLawn]

I don’t track my usage anymore but it’s too much, especially since lockdown. I came off Facebook as that was where I was spending the most time but then ‘replaced’ it with Reddit. I’ve also been lurking on here for a few months and finally made an account a couple of weeks ago.

I don’t drink, smoke or anything but thanks to health issues, I can’t go out much either. I’m lonely really even though I live with my husband and two boys. Damn, anyone else feel alone even though you live in a family unit?

 

[Beansprout]

I think as long as you don't feel it affecting your daily life then there's no need to change it! It's 2020 and technology is just part of the world. I only ever had Instagram and delete that a while ago and I can't tell you how much nicer life is without social media! But I watch a lot of YouTube and wish I could reduce time spent on messages/safari!! But I think it's definitely different for each person so don't beat yourself up!!

 

[265]

My Phone is on contract with a PAYG backup Sim *(in case of network outage)* and it's purely used for work purposes, the only thing I monitor is the amount of Mobile Data used. (especially if I'm on the backup Sim)

 

[idk2]

I think 3 hours is very impressive!! Kudos to you.

I also read ebooks consistently every night without fail on my iPhone. Sometimes if a book is that good and I have the time, I will read it all in one day which could be 6 hours easily. Last week I was on half term so not working as such and my screen time was 6 hours 35 minutes daily across all apps. The week before when I was working, it was much lower and only 3 hours 42 minutes across all apps. So I guess it varies but like another poster said, I'm not paying extortionate amount of money per month NOT to use it and I think I learn alot from apps such as Twitter.

 

[DanaScully]

I've just checked and my screen time for today is just under five hours. I'm definitely on my phone too much but I find it's the only social interaction available to me at the moment.

I used to be an avid reader but I converted to audiobooks a couple of years back and much prefer them. I have a kindle but I tend only to use it when travelling or on holiday.

 

[WilmaHun]

My screen time usually varies between 2 - 3 hours. If I ever notice it's gone over 3 hours I make a conscious effort not to go on it. 3 hours seems a huge amount of time to be on it to me, but looking at the results of the poll maybe I'm just worried about it too much!

On the flip side, my other half is never seen without his in his hand. It really annoys me actually. I feel like if I want a conversation I have to actually ask him to put his phone down otherwise I just get half-hearted answers or he'll bring something up later that we've already spoken about but because he was on his phone he's forgotten! Does anybody elses partner do this? I have no concerns about what he's doing on there, I know for a fact all he's doing it scrolling insta, fb, tik tok, looking at car photos etc etc etc but it's still annoying! I just want to be able to talk to him without a mobile phone being the centre of his attention!

 

[Lulu Goss]

On the flip side, my other half is never seen without his in his hand. It really annoys me actually. I feel like if I want a conversation I have to actually ask him to put his phone down otherwise I just get half-hearted answers or he'll bring something up later that we've already spoken about but because he was on his phone he's forgotten! Does anybody elses partner do this? I have no concerns about what he's doing on there, I know for a fact all he's doing it scrolling insta, fb, tik tok, looking at car photos etc etc etc but it's still annoying! I just want to be able to talk to him without a mobile phone being the centre of his attention!

Yep! Mentioned in my post further back but my partner just does not retain information and I’m convinced it’s because the majority of the time he’s looking at his phone when I’m speaking to him. No word of a lie, today he asked me what we were having for dinner about 8 times. Drives me mad to constantly repeat myself!

 

[Kalukawhite]

Yes drives me mad

 

[slabber]

My partner just said mid snore in his sleep, "are you on your phone? F*ck sake" and rolled over...

 

[DoctorWho]

I dress to even look at my usage the past few days

 

[meg82]

I can use my phone and tablet quite a lot during the day especially when there's not much else to do. The world we live in today had changed our interactions and attention spans and I find it a struggle to have the concentration to watch a film, tv show, read a book!

But saying that, I think this is only a big problem when it's getting in the way of other important things in your life like work, chores, paying attention to your partner.

For me, that last one has and still is a problem. I know I'm on my devices too much when I'm with my hubby and he gets annoyed because we're not "spending proper time together" so I'm trying to work on that but everything on the internet is so addictive!