It seems that the fears and anxieties field is also advancing to suit the technological progress of our days. How?
Nowadays almost every person carries around a cellular phone. Children are connected to it from a very young age as their parents play music for them using the parents’ smartphones, adults use it to communicate with their children and in moments of distress, and everybody else uses it constantly and daily, as an inter-personal form of communication that breaks down boundaries.
The device has become an inseparable part of all our lives.
But how will we feel if the battery dies on us before we have the chance to charge it? Or if, alas, we forget our phone when going to work in the morning and only reconnect to it when we come back?
The term “Nomophobia” should first be defined and explained.
Nomophobia is the post-modern anxiety that developed as a result of our deep connection to our cellular phones. The term means a fear to lose touch with our cellular phone, for any reason, including forgetting or losing it, having the device stolen, a malfunction, a battery that died on us, etc. The term was coined in 2008, following research conducted in Britain. Since then, the rate of people who felt pressure or anxiety when having to separate from their phones has been constantly rising, so much that nowadays Nomophobia is not a rare kind of anxiety at all. Despite these findings, most psychologists do not regard it as real anxiety that requires treatment, but as a normative kind of anxiety. They even claim that no person suffering from Nomophobia has ever required treatment for it.
Why is it so difficult for us to disconnect from our cellular phones? All of our acquaintances’ telephone numbers are in it, we use it to manage our meetings, reminders, and calendar, for work and to communicate with our family, as well as for social purposes. The device also includes applications and functions, that replace other devices such as computers and cameras, and even television. Many people lead their entire lives using it and therefore disconnecting from it is not easy and simple for them. In extreme cases, people feel as if they lost their whole lives when they have to be without their smartphones.
We have established that we are all connected to our cellular phones and that when, for example, we discover that the battery is about to die, our pressure rises, even slightly. But when does our situation warrant the definition of Nomophobia? Nomophobia can be identified based on familiar anxiety symptoms when these are related to being disconnected from the cellular phone:
The causes of Nomophobia are an inseparable part of the post-modern world:
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