Problematic Smartphone Use

What it is

The term describes the behaviour and leaves the explanation open. Panova and Carbonell recommended studying the behaviour in its sociocultural context, including the needs it serves, the motivations behind it and the rewards it provides.

Harris, Regan, Schueler and Fields assessed the theoretical foundations and psychometric properties of 78 scales developed over 13 years to measure or characterise excessive or problematic smartphone use. They found that many lacked adequate internal consistency and test-retest reliability, and that many had little research behind their theoretical basis.

In effect

Billieux and colleagues compared two ways of describing one person's heavy mobile phone use in 2015. A symptom-based description followed the addiction model, and a process-based description followed the individual's psychological processes. The authors argued that the second captured more, and that treating behaviours such as gambling, sex and internet use as addictions can oversimplify a person's psychological functioning.

The Why We article Is phone addiction real uses the wider term alongside the narrower one, because the papers it covers use both.

What it does not say

The term does not claim that heavy phone use is harmless or harmful. It is a descriptive label, and the papers behind it measure and name behaviour without reporting outcomes for individuals. Nothing here is advice about anyone's own phone use.

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