Nagging parents and teachers aren’t the only ones concerned with our culture’s obsessions with smartphones and social media. A recent study by Pew Research Center shows that teens are consciously logging off and stepping back from using their phones nonstop.
In fact, 52% of teens say they’re trying to limit their phone use. And 54% recognize that they spend too much time on their phones in general.
With smartphones becoming more accessible and widely used than ever, 72% of teens say they have a habit of grabbing their phones when they first wake up.
We’ve seen how checking our phones in the morning can lead to unhappiness, stress and feeling like you’re never fully caught up. So young people already thinking about ways to curb their smart phone use could be a good sign for their future mental health.
It’s not only young people who are affected. More than half of teens polled believed that their parents are distracted by phones during their conversations and 72% of parents believe the same thing about their children.
So what can app makers who thrived on our addiction to smartphones do with this information? Some devices and apps include features that encourage users to spend their time in a more healthy way with reminders of just how much time they are wasting on different apps.
The study from Pew also found that teens also are trying to cut back consumption of other digital technologies, with 57% cutting back on social media use, and 58% percent cutting back on video game play.
