A new study from the telecom and broadcast regulator Ofcom has revealed that 60% of teenage Smartphone owners are “highly addicted” to their phones, while the corresponding figure for adults is 37 per cent.

We are falling in love with, and getting addicted to, our smartphones

Ofcom’s Communication Market Report runs to 341pages providing a comprehensive overview of the UK’s internet and telecommunications, TV and radio habits. It reveals remarkably that over 81% of the owners kept their Smartphones switched on at all times, and that 38% adults and 40% teens admitted of being woken up from their sleep by their Smartphones.

Ownership figures are on an inexorable rise. Today, some 27% of all adults and 47% of teenagers in Britain own a smartphone, most of which were purchased within the past year. Apple’s iPhone is the most popular brand though teenagers appear to favour the BlackBerry – it is the favoured brand of 37% of teenagers.

The huge take up of the technology is leading to a rapid increase in the use of mobile internet use. The most visited website on handheld devices, with 43 million hours spent on it in December 2010 alone, is inevitably, Facebook.

Work and play boundaries getting blurred

The phenomena is having a dramatic effect on the way we work, with the lines between work and social becoming increasingly blurred, cutting both ways.

For whilst 30% of smartphone users say they regularly take personal phone calls during working hours (the figure is 23 per cent for regular mobile phone users) 70% of them will take work calls while on holiday or annual leave, with 24% saying that they have done this regularly. Only 16% of ordinary mobile phone users do so.

The report states that 58% of adult males owned a smartphone compared to only 42% of females. However this trend is reversed among teenagers with 52% of female girls using smartphones as opposed to 48% of teenage boys.

The degree to which people cannot leave their ordinary mobile phones alone has always struck me. I find it extraordinary that people can meet up with you for a drink, and spend most of their time fiddling with their mobile phones. Presumably this trend if likely to increase with smart phones.

Half of teens answer their smartphones on the toilet

Fifty one per cent of adults and 65 percent of teens admitted to playing around with their smart phones during a meal. More interestingly in terms of addictive behavioural patterns 22 percent of adults and 47 percent of teens had answered a call while using the toilet.

Technology does indeed offer great benefits, but it brings a level of expectation and stress with it which is not always immediately apparent. Before the fax machine was invented, people had an entire day to deal with the post in their in-tray. Now everything is instantaneous, and whilst that is fantastic in so many ways, it also notches up the stress levels and the demands considerably.

I imagine that we have now entered a time when you will soon be treated with extreme pity if you do not  own a smartphone. The new Luddites will just have to make do with a computer and a broadband connection at home, and some peace and quiet at other times.

addiction, Ofcom, smartphone, technology Health, Internet, Science & Technology