How Many Times Do You Touch Your Phone a Day?
In my last?article?I shared why we are living in the age of digital overwhelm and?what?this?means?for our lives.
Today I want to share some more research into how we interact with our phones, and the moment that?changed my relationship with my tech forever.
It’s 2017 and I’m in a Retreat Centre enjoying the warmth of Montpellier in the south of France. I’m half-way through my annual meditation retreat. I’m there to get to know myself and become more self-aware.
But instead, I’m locked in a toilet cubicle on my phone. I’m in a slightly manic state, furtively jumping from email, to app, to web page with an unchained hunger to find something new.
As I sit there, I’m suddenly aware of what I’m doing.?It’s as if I have caught myself red-handed. I’m finally confronted by a truth I was unwilling to see. I’m on my phone to avoid uncomfortable feelings. To escape myself.
In that moment I admit that?I have a bad relationship with my tech.
As I start to share this revelation with friends I quickly realise I’m not alone, or the only one unwilling to recognise the problem.
In 2016 research firm Dscout tracked 94 Android users mobile-device-related action for 24 hours a day for five days. Actions like typing, tapping, and swiping the phone's screen counted as a "touch.”?They found that an average user touches their phone 2,617 time every day, with heavy-users clocking 5,427.
I was most interested to learn that participants dramatically underestimated their daily use: “I will probably touch my phone 500 times today.” “Oh!! I touched my phone 5,000 times today?!” The study also showed that?87% of participants checked their phones at least once between midnight and 5am. At a time when 2/3 of adults aren’t getting enough sleep.
As I evaluated my phone-use with honesty, I noticed how frequently I looked at my phone in the middle of the night. I realised that checking in with my digital world just before I closed my eyes for sleep had become my new normal.
I started to look into how this could be impacting my health and came across another?study?from 2014. Researchers found that the?use of portable light-emitting screens immediately before bedtime has biological effects that may perpetuate sleep deficiency?and disrupt circadian rhythms. Both of which can have adverse impacts on performance, health, and safety.
Sleep is vital for our physical and mental wellbeing. Dr. Matt Walker, Professor of Neuroscience and Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, did an excellent?TED talk?on how poor sleep impacts our health.
It turns out that using your phone first thing in the morning is also a problem. In an interview on the?Jordan Harbinger Show?Matt is quite clear that mobile device use at bedtime?and?in the morning is messing up our sleep.
“You don’t want to look at your phone in the middle of the night, and?you definitely don’t want to look at it first thing in the morning either. This expectation of your phone creates anxiety, and microdoses of anticipatory anxiety correlate with the depth of your sleep.” ~ Dr Matt Walker.
As I became more aware of how my digital habits were impacting my sleep, I started to notice other ways that my tech was impacting my mental wellbeing.
Tomorrow, I’ll share with you?how social media was impacting my mental health and the research that helped me make some changes.
Want to build a better relationship with your devices?
I'm hosting a handful of free workshops to get you started.
Habits for Digital Wellness (live session)
Join me on Friday May 5th at 4pm GMT to celebrate Digital Wellness Day, and make some time to develop habits for your own wellbeing.
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In this one-hour interactive session, you'll choose an experiment from our Digital Habit Lab, and learn how to apply it to your life straight away.
Digital Habit Foundations (live session)
Join me on Wednesday May 10th at 4pm GMT for a live one-hour session introduction into the science and neuroscience of tech and digital wellness, and how to reduce distraction by taking control of notifications on your own terms.
Getting M.O.R.E. from your tech (live session)
Join me on Thursday May 18th at 4pm GMT where I share a one-hour distillation of the methodology we teach at the Mind over Tech.
I hope you’ll join me, I look forward to seeing you there.
Jonathan Garner Founder of Mind over Tech
A seasoned web developer and user experience designer, Jonathan has spent the last 10 years designing and delivering programmes that demystify disruptive technologies, like Machine Learning and AI, to C-suite leaders around the world. ?
In 2015, while on a meditation retreat, Jonathan suddenly found himself doomscrolling in a locked toilet cubicle. He founded Mind over Tech with the mission to help himself, and others, find a better relationship with their tech while embracing the gifts of the digital world.
He firmly believes that exploring our digital habits can turn the mundane reality of emailing and zooming into fuel for personal transformation.