Did you know what nomophobia is, probably not but at the same time, maybe you are infected with this. As we all know and see we are surrounded by electronic media all over. And everyone has at least one or more than one cell phone in their pocket all the time. Somehow our day-to-day and face-to-face interactions with other people have been taken care of by digital devices. Especially nowadays youth are addicted to smartphones so much that they are unable to concentrate on their life, future goals, and the most important “Relationships”. An analysis conducted among undergraduate students in Health Services resulted in that out of 547 males, 23% of the students were labeled as nomophobia, while 64% of students were at risk of developing nomophobia. Almost 77% of students checked their cell phones more than 35 times per day.[1]Think If Issac Newton was also indulging in smartphones at that time, then maybe he was unable to think about gravity and so on. Let's find out together, What exactly Nomophobia is?

Let me explain, nomophobia is a term used to denote fear of being without a smartphone. The fear of being away from the phone or the anxiety that an individual feels is also the synonym of Nomophobia. Especially nowadays youth are addicted to smartphones so much that they are unable to concentrate on their life, future goals, and the most important “Relationships”.We’ve all seen the couples sitting together in a restaurant ignoring each other and engaging with their smartphones instead. Most of us are rarely ever more than five feet from our smartphones. Like the use of drugs and alcohol, they can trigger the release of the brain chemical dopamine and alter your mood. You can also rapidly build up a tolerance so that it takes more and more time in front of these screens to derive the same pleasurable reward. Staring at your phone will deny you the face-to-face interactions that can help to meaningfully connect you to others, alleviate anxiety, and boost your mood. In other words, the remedy you’re choosing for your anxiety (engaging with your smartphone), is making your anxiety worse. The persistent buzz, ping, or beep of your smartphone can distract you from important tasks, slow your work, and interrupt those quiet moments that are so crucial to creativity and problem-solving. Instead of ever being alone with our thoughts, we’re now always online and connected. And this lowers one's creativity in every field. Its symptoms are so normal that it's sometimes hard to identify the pattern. The fear of missing out on something that even does not exist is such a scary thing to happen for an individual and many peoples living their life with it in this digital era. They feel disconnected in between the group of large gatherings. According to Shambare et al. (2012), cell phones are “possibly the biggest non-drug addiction of the 21st century”. Nowadays college students are spending more than 9 hours per day on their mobile phones, which leads to addiction. It's like a drug addiction, which others consume externally in the form of biological substances and form a habit of regular consumption. It is an example of “a paradox of technology” having both the property of freeing and enslaving. Freeing from the real world and enslaving to the virtual world.[3]

The fear of being out of battery or the unavailability of the Internet also shows the sign of Nomophobia. It could be easily seen from the surveys that young adults are more likely to be addicted to nomophobia. The survey revealed that most of the teens (77%) reported anxiety when they were without their mobile phones. Scientists suggest certain psychological predictors for suspecting nomophobia in a person which are - “self-negative thoughts, younger age, low esteem, self-efficacy, high extroversion/introversion, impulsiveness and sense of urgency and seeking”.[2] Phones addiction leads to various health problems also like depression, anxiety, anger, sleep problems, etc. Nomophobia not only affects the mental level but also affects the individual physically by reducing the eye power or the adverse effect of using mobile phones in bad posture leads to very adverse and irreversible health conditions. As the radiation emitting from mobiles phone also responsible for some health problems, that's why it is advice to keep your phone switch off or in airplane mode, at night while sleeping and also advice to not use phones 1 hour before going to bed because it emits blue light rays which causes insomnia in some cases. One can easily identify if someone suffering from it by observibg their lifesyle pattern.Th

The early age diagnosis plays a major role in this problem. Counseling with specialists and their practices helps to control nomophobia. There are medications also like anti-anxiety medications or antidepressants to address some of your symptoms but they are not a permanent solution to it. There are therapies also like exposure therapy in which you gradually make distance with your smart devices instead of sudden boycott like leaving your phone in another room for some time and trying to focus on some other stuff. Meditation also plays an important practice in slowly breaking down Nomophobia. This problem requires will and self-determination more than any treatment. And this can be provided by the victim's family, friends or colleagues, etc.

So my idea is to make people unaddicted to this syndrome and come up with an idea resembling the old quote like iron cut iron. The most addictive things on smartphones are apps, so I have an idea to design an app that cuts down the addiction part and then only people use the smartphone for important work only to do things efficiently and constructively. So basically an app that would monitor the toggling duration of the user and they will get points if they don't use their smartphone for a specific number of hours. And the reward increases exponentially with the duration of toggling of Smartphones and from these Rewards they can buy their daily needs items. The less they use their smartphones, the bigger rewards they get. This practice will for sure help in reducing unnecessary use of smartphones and will turn them into a habit. And this app offers other features also, which help users to use their smartphones in a much more efficient and needful way. The app offers limited-time usage of a Particular app, set by the user itself.
If with that we can divert today's youth mind from constantly focussing on smartphones, then we surely see some of the best minds changing the world with their ideas. These digital technologies are innovated to help humans to work efficiently but in the wrong hands or immature, people they are devastating for us. So, in my opinion, one should use the digital gadgets wisely and as per requirement for a limited amount and in this the upbringing plays a very important role because initially, a child is like molten gold, to which guardian can shape them sensibly.

Reference

1. Bivin JB, Mathew P, Thulasi PC, Philip J. Nomophobia-do we really need to worry about? Rev Prog. 2013;1:1–5. [Google Scholar]
2. Bianchi A, Phillips JG. Psychological predictors of problem mobile phone use. Cyber Psychol Behav. 2005;8:39–51. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
3. Mick DG, Fournier S. Paradoxes of technology: Consumer cognizance, emotions, and coping strategies. J Consumer Res. 1998:123–43. [Google Scholar]
4. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6510111/