Smartphones Are Hurting Our Kids Although smartphones have only been around for 30 years, it has become a crucial part of our life. With smartphones, we are able to connect with colleagues, teachers, friends, families, and even the outside world. We have instant access to countless information and continuous updates on current events and issues. However, our obsession with smartphones has a dark side. Research over the past few years has shown that smartphones are actually hurting people, specifically children.
The constant checking update on smartphone has interrupt teenager’s sleep and even cause insomnia. In “How does smartphone” (2015), the article explain that the teenager who keep tracking for social media update and message do not get a good sleep at night. Next, the smartphone addiction can affect teenager’s studies. Teenagers who are addicted to smartphone will find themselves hard to focus on their studies. The games on smartphone required them to keep online and playing so that they can clear the stage in those games faster.
This link comes from the lack of exercise and increased eating habits that occur when spending long periods of time watching television. Each hour spent watching TV per day increases the chances of getting diabetes by 3.4 percent (Schroeder, 2015). Television is also one of the main causes of obesity. Since television was created, obesity rates have risen gradually. A research published in “The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition” found that for every hour spent watching television, there was a 2.2 pounds of body mass was gained by the viewer.
People will get distracted when the smartphone notification is pop up, especially people who forget to turn off their phone into silent mode when working and it will affect the product of their work. It is same goes to students nowadays, students’ memory become poorer because too dependent on smartphone. The date of important events, people’s contact number, reminder in the smartphone will ‘share responsibility’ with human’s minds. This causes human lazy to use their mind to think, reduce people’s intelligence and attention spans. According to the researchers at University Of Texas, people who have smartphone within eye shot are worse to conduct work and remember information.
Behavioral changes from one generation to the next naturally occur little by little. Nonetheless, changes in adolescent behavior from the millennial generation triumphing it have been substantial and revolutionary. Today’s teens have never witnessed a world without internet. The majority of them possess smartphones and waste several hours each week on social media. But while numerous parents may feel allayed about their teens’ seeming uninterested in drinking, driving and dating, they could perhaps be overlooking the effects that continuous internet access has on their teens’ mental well-being.
Or not doing well on tests because last night instead of studying you were on your smartphone? The issue of phone addiction is growing at a rapid rate. About seventy two percent of people said they are rarely more than five feet away from their phone at any time. The consequences of smartphone addiction can be very serious. Talking to your friends online all the time is different than talking to your friends in person.
However, there is disparity between parents and children thinking on what the parents want their children in using the device and what actually their children use them for. For example, they play video games, watching video and chatting with their friend with the smartphone all the time. The addiction with smartphone becomes unpleasant for their education. In addition, they reduce the time spend in doing homework and got bad grade in exam due to poor preparation as using their smartphone frequently. In summary, there is need for a better understanding on the usage of smartphone among the children.
Laziness is one of the major disadvantages of improving technology because laziness causes many problems for the kids such as obesity. Hampton says that laziness create obesity for the children she exemplifies this statement with the statistics from the United States Disease Control and Prevention center, by saying: “The Center for U.S. Disease Control and Prevention reported that approximately 10 percent of preschool kids, and 15 percent of children ages 6–17, are considered obese, with many others close to becoming overweight.”(Hampton) What is the connection of laziness and technology than? Technology is at the center of this problem because it is the reason for this laziness. Children stops spending time with other activities such as doing sports. Hampton suggests that children should take at least one hour of their computer time for their psychical activities and
Today adults see kids on their phones and say, “Kids aren’t able to do anything but be on their phones.” Unfortunately to a point they are right. They spend too much time on their devices that it becomes addicting, which results in life changes. Technology has been a big part of our life that we have relied on. We must ask ourselves how many of us could go a week without our phones? We have relied on our devices to get our information.
I think because of video games and media that adolescents think it is okay for violence and sexualy activity. Their brain is not able to decipher what is right and wrong and it leads them to make poor choices, which leads to school/public shootings and rape. I believe this is a problem because their parents are not able to be there to push them into the right direction because they are at work most of the day, and adolescents are at home alone possibly with their friends and they end up making poor choices with one another. In today’s society, you see more older people working than you do teenagers. It is very difficult for a teenager to get a job, because of their maturity level, the responsibility that goes with it and et cetera.