Fewer American teens today feel “addicted” to their mobile device compared to three years ago, reflecting increasing normalization of smartphone use among children.
According to a new survey by Common Sense Media, a nonprofit organization that studies technology use by children and families, more than half of teens who use a mobile device wake up at night to check social media or read notifications, and 43% say they check their device a few times an hour.
Yet fewer teens today say they are addicted to their mobile device compared to a comparable sample group surveyed by the same nonprofit in 2016 – only 39% today compared to 50% in 2016. Parents, on the other hand, have grown more concerned, with 45% self-reporting as feeling addicted to their mobile device, a double-digit increase over the three-year period.
Why are these trends moving in oppose directions? Common Sense Media says one possible factor is “normalization” of mobile device use among children today. Whereas adults have a point of comparison to a time without smartphones, today’s teens “have been surrounded by technology since birth… [and] do not have a comparison to a time without mobile devices.”
The survey also found that teens and their parents argue less about mobile devices than they did three years ago. The report questioned why this might be: “Is this a reflection that people have resigned themselves to being distracted? Perhaps we are observing the emergence of tech apathy within the home or a realization that mobile devices have changed the nature of our daily lives so it’s not worth fighting about.”
In its introduction to the new study, Common Sense backtracked from assertions it had made in a 2016 study, entitled Technology Addiction: Concern, Controversy, and Finding Balance. The nonprofit saysafter publishing its 2016 report there was substantial pushback from some researchers as to whether technology use could be an “addiction” or not.
The survey methodology changed between 2016 and 2019 from an all-phone sample to half phone and half online “to reflect the recommended methodology of collecting data today.” The report noted that this methodological change could account for some of the differences over time in responses.
Why it matters
- Today’s teens are among the first to come of age in the smartphone era, so there is little data available to help understand how smartphones affect adolescent development.
- Studies like this one give us new information about how families are coping with technological changes.
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