THIS is how long you spend staring at your mobile phone.

Research released by global market research company TNS found people aged 16 to 30 were addicted to their mobile devices, spending about 3.2 hours a day on them.

That adds up to a shocking 49 days stuck to electronic devices.

But that’s not all.

We also pick up our phones to look at them a whopping 150 times a day.

And what are we doing on our phones?

Staring at social media, with 63 per cent of people using it daily.

Watching videos online also steals the attention away from 50 per cent of us.

The average smart phone also has 60 to 70 apps, but only about 10 are actually used regularly by the phone owner.

Mobile phone usage of the younger generation is vastly higher than those aged 46 to 65, who prefer more traditional forms of entertainment.

Baby Boomers spend about three hours per day watching TV, reading newspapers or listening to the radio.

They only spend 1.5 hours on their phones and 24 per cent use Facebook every day.

TNS Sydney executive director Alistair Leathwood said he didn’t believe technology had taken away our ability to concentrate on tasks but we were losing our capability to “live in the moment”.

“Instead of quietly observing we feel we need to be doing something like consuming, recording or sharing,” he said.

“We have also lost the ability to be bored and be quiet and we are entertaining ourselves in micro-minutes, watching videos or reading funny stories.”

A researcher is encouraging people to switch off every now and then.Source:News Limited

Mr Leathwood said there was a danger of losing connection with people, particularly friends and family.

“I don’t believe that we’ve lost it, but we’ve all had the experience of sitting at a dinner table while half of the people are checking their phones,” he said.

“I think that takes away the subtleties of connecting with a person.”

Research also shows that majority of people don’t turn their phones off at any point in the day, including when they are on holidays.

One of the only times people are forced to put their smartphones down is when there is no coverage.

“This shows we are never really switching off and recharging our batteries,” Mr Leathwood said.

For about a third of Australians, the first thing they do in the day is go online.

Research shows, it’s also the last thing they do.

“You might just want to pause and take your time,” Mr Leathwood said.

“Enjoy the sunrise and don’t reply to that work email at 6am.

“You need some time in the day just being.”

Mr Leathwood said the research opened his eyes to how much society relied on technology.

About 85 per cent of people use smartphones and Mr Leathwood said that number had skyrocketed in only eight years.

“It took televisions 50 years to get that kind of penetration and 20 years for a PC,” he said.

“Smartphones are changing our society and it’s happening faster than we can change our habits to catch up, which is why I don’t think there are hard and fast rules on what the etiquette is when using them at social gatherings.

“They are fastly becoming the only device we need.”

Credits: World news.com

Comment or Share about this article!!!