Are you fond of checking your phone for email and Blackberry messages every five minutes? Do you reach for it during a board meeting or religious services when all phones should be switched off? Then you may have caught the fever.

Experts say if you respond to emails, Blackberry messages, Facebook, Twitter or WhatsApp messages at night and you feel disconnected when you wake up with no message from the various social networking sites on your mobile app, you are a smart phone addict.

It is not only you. Experts say America and South Korea, with over 2.5 million smart phone addicts, are currently battling with this addiction among their student population.

They say it has reduced the mental and academic performance of their students who are ardent users of mobile devices.

According to a Rutgers University study, being addicted to your Blackberry is similar to being addicted to drugs. The study authors add that as many as 40 per cent of smart phone users could be described as being addicted to the Internet or some form of mobile technology.

Anything can be abused, including smart phones, says psychologist, Dr. Laura Martin, who wrote the book, “Breaking Technology,” in which she describes how her addiction to smart phone almost took her life in a road traffic accident in 2012.

Flashing back to before the unfortunate incident, Martin says, “I used to check my smart phone compulsively. And the more I used it, the more I had the urge to look at it. In the office, while walking my kids to school, in meetings… Even while making breakfast.

“Sometimes, it is in my hand before I even know what I’m searching for. Sometimes, I tap the screen absent mindedly – looking at my email, a local blogger, my calendar, and Twitter. I was holding on to it every minute. I was even typing on it when I was hit by a car right in my neigbourhood.”

It is a modern compulsion, according to a 2012 survey by the Pew Research Centre, which says 46 per cent of all adults now own a smart phone not because they need it but because they want it.

That modern gadgets have changed the world is an understatement. No one wants to go back to the days of no television, no Internet and definitely no cell phone.

Each day, tech companies churn out the latest versions of laptops and mobile phones, while household and kitchen appliances are not left out.

While it is easy to get caught up in the rave of the moment, there is increasing scientific evidence linking ‘electropollution’ to the rise in cancer, birth defects, fibromyalgia (rheumatic condition characterized by muscular or musculoskeletal pain with stiffness and localized tenderness at specific points on the body), Alzheimer’s disease, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, depression, learning disabilities and even Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

According to the World Health Organisation, ‘electronic smog,’ created by electricity, is “one of the most common and fastest growing environmental influences.” Experts therefore warn that it is important that one is fully aware of the ill effects of these modern gadgets on health.

CONTINUE READING HERE http://www.punchng.com/health/healthwise/reduce-time-spent-on-gadgets-this-weekend/ Cc: lalasticlala,Ishilove

''I was even typing on it when I was hit by a car right in my neigbourhood.”
this one is strong oh,village witches must be at work

Moderation with self discpline is always the best thing to avoid such deep addictions.

Me love my smartphone joor.. Addiction or not