Here is the latest reminder that you use your phone way too much: 81 percent of smartphone users keep their phone nearby during nearly every waking hour, and 51 percent check their phone at least a few times an hour, according to a new study by Gallup Panel. Yet, 61 percent believe they don’t check their phone as often as their peers.
A survey of 16,000 adult smartphone users found that only 4 percent of users use their phone once or less than once a day, whereas 11 percent say they use their phone every few minutes, this number doubling to 22 percent when skewed younger, 18 to 29.
Other notable numbers: Sixty-three percent of users keep their phones nearby while sleeping. IPhone owners are slightly more likely to check their phones more frequently than Android users. Those with at least some college education are found to check their phone more frequently, an average of 43 percent claiming to check their phone a few times an hour, than those without, only 34 percent.
Despite the data, a majority of users, 61 percent, believe they use their phone less frequently than their peers. Twenty-eight percent of users believe they are on par with their peers, and only 11 percent believe they use their phone more often than the norm. Of those that check their phone every few minutes, only a third of them believe this is above-average behavior. This denial may reveal a cultural shame to being attached to one’s smartphone that users will not admit to, according to Gallup.
“It’s possible that Americans either misperceive what others are doing, or that they feel it is a socially undesirable behavior and therefore want to believe that they aren’t doing it as much as others,” the Gallup study says.
This study falls in line with a recent Bank of America study on smartphone use, which showed that 89 percent of users check their phones at least a few times a day; 71 percent sleep near their phones; and 23 percent of adults have admitted to sleeping with their phone in their hand, with this number nearly doubling to 44 percent among younger users.
Photo by Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press archives