How much do you use your mobile phone and could you live without it? According to the 2016 Deloitte Mobile Consumer Survey, this year marks a decade since the launch of the first full touchscreen smartphone.
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People the world over are more connected than ever through social media platforms like Facebook while instant messaging and applications like Instagram are making it easier to show people what we are doing rather than tell. We can do our banking, search the internet, do our shopping and use Google Maps. We use it to consume our news, create videos and share special moments.
According to the Deloitte report, Australian mobile consumers interact with their smartphone 480 million times a day. Apps lead the way when it comes to streaming music. Seventy-nine per cent use their smartphone device for social networking, 79 per cent for finding directions and 71 per cent for completing online shopping transactions.
About a third of smartphone consumers do not use their phone to make a voice call. The report also reported that a quarter of Australians aged 18 to 24 said excessive use of their phone had caused disagreements with their partner – this increased for those aged 25 to 34.
For a connected society, have we forgotten the art of having a one-on-one conversation with another person? It was once a social faux-pas to touch a phone when at the dinner table, at work and at school. Now you can look around a crowded restaurant in Launceston on a Friday and Saturday night to see how many consumers are on their mobile phone rather than interacting with their dinner guests.
As part of National Science Week, researchers from Griffith, Murdoch and Western Sydney university are undergoing studies to see how smartphones impact on our lives – and no doubt it will not all be positive. Murdoch researcher Lynette Vernon has reported that late night phone use directly contributes to poor sleep, making it harder to function during the day while leading to declines in mental health and well-being. Closer to home, the Road Safety Advisory Council has launched its Don’t be a goose campaign – asking people to leave their phone alone while they are driving, with inattention and distraction the leading causes of crashes on our roads. Whatever your mobile habits, it is time to have a conversation about appropriate usage.