Did you know that more than two-thirds of young Britons feel stressed from phones, 35% of 16-24-year-olds check their phones every 5 minutes and 57% of 25-34-year-olds would find life harder if they didn’t have access to What’s App? Stress Awareness Month, coordinated by the Stress Management Society (SMS), is held every April to increase public awareness about both the causes and cures for our modern stress epidemic.

Related blog: How To Monitor Your Screen Time On Smartphones

Is life better without a phone?

71% of Brits feel phones are more helpful than a hindrance. The over-55s fall above the national average with 78% stating their phones are more helpful than a hindrance. Only 56% of 16-24-year-olds feel that their phone is more helpful than a hindrance. The most helpful components of our phones, according to the survey, are making important calls (88%), checking emails (84%), and receiving alerts and updates (75%).

How do mobile phones affect our health?

• No Wi-Fi
• Low battery / Phone about to die
• Too many notifications pinging throughout the day
• Reading the news
• Negative comments on your social media posts

How do you take time away from your phone?

• Cultivate healthy boundaries with your phone.
• Set timers.
• Become mindful.
• Morning and night phone tactics.
• Be intentional with social media.

We recently conducted an independent survey to closely examine our phone use, and to see how much stress our phones cause and what the biggest stressors of our phones are. So let's look at the results and see if our reliance on tech needs to be halted. Unsurprisingly, the survey revealed that more than two-thirds of young Britons (67%) feel their phones make them feel stressed. The perfect storm of high amounts of social media use and frequent checking for notifications, combined with a lack of sustained uninterrupted sleep seems to be playing a part in causing young people to be heading towards a stress epidemic.

The majority of 16-24 year olds revealed they get an average of 6-7 hours of sleep per night with 93% stating they sleep with their phones in their bedrooms. Not only are they not getting enough sleep, but a third are checking their phones more than 7 times per night, leading to interrupted sleep.

The survey found that people between the ages of 16-34 are more likely to feel stressed over their phones than those aged 35 and older. More than two-thirds of people aged 16-34 felt stress over having no Wi-Fi and low battery. Those figures steadily declined as people got older, although just over half (56%) of 45–54-year-olds felt stressed about low Wi-Fi and low battery. Only a third of those over 55 felt stressed over having a low battery.

But perhaps the most glaring difference between the younger generations compared to the over 55s is the stress felt about feeling left out. Half of 16-24-year-olds reported feeling stressed when seeing their friends attend events that they weren’t invited to compared to only 8% of those over 55s feeling stressed over this.

Denise Timmis, Brand Manager of Envirofone, said:

“Some of the results of this survey are alarming, especially when seeing how much stress people are experiencing when it comes to their phones.  With April being Stress Awareness Month, we have joined forces with Registered Therapist and Certified Psychological Coach, Sarah Tombs, to offer some top tips on how to manage phone use for better mental health. Although the majority of people feel their phones are more helpful than harmful, we still need to put systems in place to manage our phone use to prevent ourselves from becoming a nation of stressed-out Brits.”

Things to do instead of go on your phone:

• Nap
• Read
• Go for a walk
• Play games
• Learn a new hobby
• Develop new skills
• Cook
• Mindfulness
• Stretch
• Exercise

Related blog: Smartphone Tech Tips

Conclusion:

As you can see, everyone’s mobile experience is completely different depending on how you use your tech. Mobile phones are great for connecting with others, learning new things and being able to capture memories forever. But of course, all this comes with negatives. It's impossible in our current world to avoid smart tech, but we can always reduce our intake.