I bet you would love the answer to the question to be a big No.
But, the reason you ask if you are addicted to your phone could be that you have noticed your phone usage is high.
Or, you want to avoid crossing over to the addictive side.
Undoubtedly, phone addiction affects teenagers as well as adults. This is because phones are designed to be addictive.
Further, the applications created are also meant to keep you from putting your phone down so that the creators can make money.
You see, it’s not that you lack self-control in and of itself. It is that cell phone creators use science, psychology, and art to exploit various human dimensions to cause you to become hooked to your phone.
You can tell if you are hooked to your phone if you experience the following.
| Phone Addiction Sign | Meaning |
| Nomophobia | Fear of being without your phone |
| Textaphrenia | Fear of failing to receive or send a text |
| Ringxiety | Feeling as if you have received a notification and you haven’t |
| Textiety | Feelings of anxiety arising from receiving, sending, or not receiving a text |
In the next section, we will give you the symptoms associated with phone addiction, give you a quiz to assess how addicted you could be, and suggest ways of how to stop phone addiction.
Teen Phone Addiction Symptoms
According to Common Sense Media statistics, a teenager spends an average of 8–9 hours on the phone when not in school. The overall average across research done by various institutions is 7 hours 22 mins.
Do you spend that much time on your phone?
If you spend these hours on your phone every day, you could be addicted to your phone.
Consequently, if you maintain the same habit for twenty years, you’ll have spent almost ten years of your life on the phone😯. I bet it’s shocking when you look at it from that angle.
Apart from knowing if you are addicted to your phone by the number of hours, other phone addiction symptoms include:
- Social isolation: Teen phone addiction may cause you to withdraw from social interactions with family and friends. You may prefer to spend hours on your phone, scrolling through social media, messaging, and playing games, rather than engaging in face-to-face interactions.
- Irritability and anxiety: When you are separated from your phone or cannot use it for an extended period, you may be irritable, anxious, and restless.
- Poor academic performance: If you are addicted to your phone, you may spend long hours on your device, leading to less time for studying and completing homework.
- Sleep disturbances: The blue light emitted from phones can interfere with sleep, leading to difficulty falling asleep, staying asleep, and waking up feeling rested.
- Physical health issues: Excessive phone use can lead to physical health issues such as eye strain, neck and back pain, headaches, and weight gain.
If you experience these symptoms, they could be contributed by various factors such as the constant need for social validation, fear of missing out, and the pleasure derived from the dopamine hits associated with phone use.
Read more about these factors in this article: 5 Undeniable Reasons For Teen Phone Addiction.
Cell Phone Addiction Quiz
Have you read this far and still unsure if you are addicted to your phone? Not to worry. The following are twenty questions you can use to get a definitive answer.
Answer with a Yes or No; at the end, you can gauge your cell phone addiction level.
- Does using your smartphone interfere with your sleeping?
- Has your smartphone usage interfered with or affected your personal relationships?
- Do you ever feel remorse about the way you use your smartphone?
- Does your use of a smartphone boost or lower your self-esteem?
- Does your use of a smartphone cause financial problems (e.g., subscribing to paid apps, buying points/coins, or purchasing hardware or software products)?
- Does your smartphone use negatively affect your school performance?
- Do positive or negative reinforcements from your smartphone cause you to continue to use it when you know you should stop?
- Do you lose time from school because of your smartphone use?
- Has your smartphone use affected your reputation among your family, friends, or school?
- Do you try to schedule or control the use of your smartphone but find that you really cannot?
- Does good fortune drive you to use your smartphone?
- Does misfortune compel you to use your smartphone?
- Do you feel an obsessive urge to use your smartphone to escape feelings of boredom or loneliness?
- Do you crave your smartphone after a short time without it?
- Have you substituted one smartphone app for another, thinking, for example, that TikTok is the problem and switching to Instagram?
- Do you feel the urge to use your smartphone as soon as you awaken?
- Have you ever stolen to enable your continued smartphone use?
- Have you lied to or manipulated others to further your smartphone use?
- Do you feel it would be almost impossible to live without the uncontrolled use of your smartphone?
- Do you use a smartphone to enhance or replace normal sexual relationships, or has your use of a smartphone affected your sex life in some other way?
The quiz aims to help you assess your phone usage honestly and prompt your desire to make a change.
According to the creators, anything from three and above is considered a smartphone addiction. Afterward, the more you answer yes, the higher the addiction level.
How to Stop Phone Addiction
After doing the above quiz, you may have realized you need help figuring out how to reduce your phone usage.
Fortunately, reducing your phone usage to a reasonable level is possible without missing out on important conversations. The following are some examples:
- Set boundaries: You can limit the amount of time spent on the phone each day by turning off notifications and designating specific times of the day for phone use. A trick is to set the time when your friends are most active.
- Engage in other activities: It can be helpful to engage in activities that distract from phone use, such as hobbies or spending time with friends and family. These options can help to reduce the desire to constantly check the phone.
- Use apps that prevent phone addiction: Various teen and parental control apps can help reduce phone addiction by tracking phone use, setting limits, and providing reminders to take breaks from phone use.
- Pray for yourself: Prayer is a powerful way of honestly taking your needs to God, who already has the solutions. Share your fears and desires with him, and he will help you figure things out. However, his ultimate desire is for you to know him personally so that he can have more impact in your life.
- Seek support: If phone addiction significantly impacts daily life, it may be helpful to seek support from a counselor (with your parent’s permission). These resources can provide guidance and tools for managing phone addiction and developing healthier habits around phone use.
ParenTeen Kenya is one such support system to help you overcome cell phone addiction. We offer one-on-one counseling where we discuss various issues surrounding your addiction.
Afterward, you work with the counselor to develop ways of overcoming phone addiction. You can overcome phone addiction. Contact us today, and let us help you manage your phone usage.
Images by Pexel and Unsplash
Jane Kariuki is a devout Christian, Clinician, Psychologist, and founder of ParenTeen Kenya. She authored an exceptional training manual used in her teens’ workshop and an instructional guidebook for her parenting classes. If she is not training, blogging, or counseling, Jane loves to spend time with her sweet husband and three children.
