Depression comes later, smartphone dependency early

New York: In an attempt to put an end to the argument over whether depression or smartphone addiction strikes first, a recent study discovered that young people who are addicted to their phones may be more vulnerable to loneliness and despair.

An increasing amount of studies has found a connection between smartphone addiction and depressive and lonely feelings.It’s not evident, though, if smartphone dependence comes before those symptoms or if the opposite is true—that persons who are depressed or lonely are more probable to grow dependent on their phones.

Researchers Matthew Lapierre and his colleagues from the University of Arizona discovered that smartphone dependency predicts increased reports of depressive symptoms and loneliness, not the other way around, in a study including 346 participants, ages 18 to 20.

The primary finding, according to Lapierre, an assistant professor in the communication department, is that smartphone dependence accurately forecasts the onset of depressed symptoms in the future.”There’s an issue where people are simply overly reliant on the gadget, in terms of experiencing uneasy if they don’t have it easily accessible and they’re using it to the damage of their day-to-day life.”

Lapierre and his co-authors’ study, which will be published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, focuses on smartphone dependency as opposed to general smartphone use, which has certain advantages.

According to Pengfei Zhao, a co-author of the study, knowing the direction of the association between smartphone dependency and negative psychological effects is essential to knowing how to best address the issue.

“If loneliness and depressive symptoms cause smartphone dependency, we could reduce dependency by managing people’s mental well-being,” Zhao added.”But if smartphone dependency (precedes depression and loneliness), which is what we found, we can reduce smartphone dependency to maintain or improve wellbeing.”

Study participants were asked to score a series of phrases, such as “I panic when I cannot use my smartphone,” on a four-point scale. This made it possible for the researchers to measure people’s reliance on smartphones.

The study concentrated on older teens, a population that is significant, according to researchers, since they are at a transitional age and stage in life where they are more susceptible to negative mental health consequences, such depression. They also grew up mostly with cellphones.

“It can be less difficult for young adults to fall addicted to cell phones, and gadgets may have a more adverse impact on them as they currently very at risk for sadness or loneliness,” Zhao stated.

The researchers recommended that when people are anxious, they should employ alternative healthy coping mechanisms, such as exercising or meditating, or reaching out to a close friend for assistance.