Cell Phone Addiction Earns Its Name

Are you always checking for your phone? Are others often frustrated that you use your phone at dinner, during class or work meetings?

In ’08, researchers in the UK invented the term Nomophobia, a.k.a “No-mobile-phobia” as the fear of and obsession with – you guessed it – losing and/or being without a smart phone.

If you think about the relationship you have with your phone, laptop or technology in general, it’s probably not very difficult to imagine how losing it would be stressful and upsetting – but when phone use hinders a relationship, school or work performance, nomophobia is actually a treatable addiction (though it’s not yet recognized as an official mental disorder).

According to ABC, “One survey found 74 percent of people would panic over losing a phone. Another found two-thirds fear being apart from their mobile device. It’s a finding echoed by University of Maryland researchers who asked students to disconnect from all media for 24 hours.”

Typically this condition is coupled with a behavioral/mood disorder, like OCD, and treated as a co-occurring disorder with substance abuse. Monitoring phone use, turning the phone off for set periods of time each day, replacing phone use with other activities and speaking to a professional are all healthy ways of coping with “nomophobia.”

Do you have a ‘healthy’ relationship with your cell?