Texting teens close eyes to real world

Communication has evolved dramatically ever since the invention of Morse code. The telephone followed soon after, plus computers, e-mail, and Internet, finally ending with the cell phone. These new inventions caused endless joy to many people upon their debut. However, one event not resulting from the first five technological advances that cell phones are causing, is abuse and addiction.

According to a recent study conducted by Harris Interactive, 47 percent of teens can text with their eyes closed. Fifty-seven percent “view their cell phone as the key to their social life.” Why do teens–and adults, too, for that matter–obsess so much over having top-of-the-line cell phones and over 50 different apps for a device originally invented to make one-on-one long-distance communication easier?

Cell phone addiction is quickly becoming the latest “trend” worldwide. A 12-year-old and a 13-year-old from Spain, after a year’s time of cell phone usage, found themselves admitted to a mental hospital for treatment, according to Drug Rehab Treatment Centers. The two would spend five to six hours a day on their phones and could not function normally.

“Their treatment will resemble that of drug addicts and those with obsessive-compulsive disorder,” the DRTS website said.

Similar, yet not so extreme, cases occur in the United States, as well.

“A friend of mine got her phone taken up sometime last week, and she had a meltdown,” junior Ashleigh Deaton said. “She was, like, crying, and she was, like, ‘Oh, I can’t talk to everybody.’ I was, like, ‘Girl, it’ll be alright if you don’t have your phone.’ And this weekend, she was borrowing mine.”

However, some students in America are working to kick their phone-using habits. For example, less than half of 250 private school students from Riverdale Country School in Bronx, NY, participated in a study in which they swore off cell phones for a whole weekend beginning on a Saturday morning.

The New York Times reported, “This text-free Sunday, the Riverdale students said, was unusually relaxing. They were shocked at how quickly they finished their homework, undistracted by an always-open video chat, or checking in on Facebook or responding to a hundred messages they typically get in a day.”

Despite some teens’ efforts, however, cell phone addiction has become so common that even “Digital Trends,” a website that acts as an information guide on the latest technological news and updates, has a list of 10 signs of a cell phone addict.

Some signs–including number six (cutting back on necessities to pay for a cell phone bill) and number four (feeling like a friend has died when the phone breaks)–are more easily recognizable. However, other signs are more subtle, such as spending more money on phone accessories than on the phone itself (number 10).

Teens and adults alike are having a difficult time waking up to the reality that cell phones do not run their lives.

“I think that it’s just superficial,” Deaton said. “If you don’t talk to the people you’re texting in person, then you don’t have a real relationship. People just need to chill out and go with the flow and stop worrying about what everyone else is doing.”

People rely on these devices for everything under the sun, from checking one’s e-mail–which a computer can accomplish just as well–to scheduling one’s entire day (stores sell daily planners for just this purpose!).

Only time will tell whether, in another decade or so, we will become like the futuristic humans of the Pixar movie “Wall-E”: communicating with each other solely through technological means, even when we are within an arm’s length of each other.