This study at the University of Missouri is making its way around the blogosphere:
While completing the first puzzle, the researchers recorded participants’ heart rate and blood pressure responses. Participants then reported their levels of anxiety and how unpleasant or pleasant they felt during the word search puzzle. Next, and while in possession of their iPhones, participants were informed that their iPhones were causing “Bluetooth interference” with the wireless blood pressure cuff, and that they needed to be placed further away in the room for the remainder of the experiment. The researchers then provided the participants a second word search puzzle. While working on the puzzle, the researchers called the participants’ iPhones. After the phones finished ringing, researchers collected blood pressure and heart rate responses. Participants then reported their levels of anxiety and how unpleasant or pleasant they felt during the word search puzzle. The researchers found a significant increase in anxiety, heart rate and blood pressure levels, and a significant decrease in puzzle performance when the participants were separated from their iPhones as compared to when iPhone users completed similar word search puzzles while in possession of their iPhones.
Seems to me the anxiety was driven not by the absence of the iPhone, but by being able to hear a call coming in and not being able to do anything about it. Not sure what that proves.
It proves that we are all part of Pavlov’s dog pack.
I agree that they’re missing doing a blood pressure/anxiety reading between the two tests, while the phone wasn’t in the possession of the user, but before the researchers called it. That would show if there was any separation anxiety.
But, that’s not to say I don’t believe that people have separation anxiety from their phones.
It would have been more interesting if they did this while ensuring the phones did NOT ring (i.e.: blocking cellular signal to the building). All this shows (like you said) is that missing a phone call (or probably getting a text message and not being able to check it, but hearing the alert) causes some anxiety.
Being without your smartphone is going to cause some of that anxiety in the first place because you are wondering if there is a text or a missed phone call that you should be following up on. Having it in the same room and knowing for certain that there is a missed phone call is almost certainly going to cause some anxiety.
If we go camping and we are without cellular signal I feel increased anxiety for the first night. By the time I wake up the next morning, being without cellular signal is liberating and relaxing. Kinda like that first day on vacation you find yourself still thinking about work, but by day two or three you have forgotten that work matters and you are enjoying your vacation — enjoying life.
This doesn’t seem like a well-designed study. First, this has little to do with “iPhones” other than that will grab headlines. This experiment doesn’t even have to do with modern smartphones. This could just as well have been done with a flip phone as they simply tested calls and texts.
I’m not sure it’s news that there is some level in anxiety when you can hear but not answer your phone, as in you are prevented from answering out of your control as was the case in this experiment. The same was probably true of landlines if someone prevented you from answering your phone. It’s one thing to choose to ignore and another to be prevented from answering.
I’m not even sure this is a good start to more experiments that may answer such concerns. All it seems to show is that people don’t like when things are out of their control, which we probably already knew.
I have to laugh at people these days, especaily teens who don’t seem to know what to do with themselves if they can’t get signal. (And Gods help them if the battery goes flat)
People have to remember that Mobile Phones, along with the bulk of other technologies and devices are conveniences, but for most, they’ve become dependencies, and that’s made us weak. (And by us, I mean other people, not me.)
I’ve seen people lose their minds just because the power goes out. And I’m shocked by the number of people that are completely unprepared for those little events.
There are actually plenty of things you can do that are generally more productive and constructive that you can spend time at that would have otherwise been taken up with checking facebook and twitter. The internet isn’t going to miss you, it’s not even going to notice you aren’t there. The world will not end, and if it did, Google wouldn’t have been any help anyway.
As has been stated, this doesn’t seems to be the most definitive of studies. However, just as the scientific method works, others will take this research and expand on it, devising new ways to test to reduce the margin of error, and to account for the unknowns. I’m curious to know if people would respond with the same – or similar – levels of anxiety when someone else’s phone is ringing. I know I do.
I am suspicious of confirmation bias in this study. Why only iPhones in the study. Is an iPhone user more likely to feel anxiety than an Android user due to separation? I doubt it. Heck, let’s include Tamagotchi’s as well, buzzing away in the corner, slowly starving… Oh, my phone is interfering with the bluetooth blood pressure cuff? Cool, I’ll put it airplane mode, problem solved. I can’t believe this study won an award.
Yeah, they specifically targeted iPhone users, but don’t explain why. The participants constituted a sample of about 1/10 the size required to produce a statistically significant result (something I learned in a level 400 statistics class at the University of Missouri by coincidence).
They also did a questionnaire on the subject of how they consider their cellphones a central part of their identity. Sounds like a lot of confirmation bias going on there.
This study does seem to be problematic on so many levels. This is where I did my graduate study, and I don’t even remember having any Phd candidates at the journalism school at the time.
UNC Chapel Hill seemed to be where most doctoral candidates in journalism were studying. Back in those days, a masters was considered a terminal degree for journalists who were going to have something other than an academic career. (And here I am now talking out the side of my mouth, in an academic position with a masters.)
Same blood pressure + anxiety would be caused by your old-fashioned rotary dial phone ringing in the next room. Because you’re missing a call.
Ding!
I read the full study, and they definitely didn’t control for ringing by having a non-ringing sub-group. Seems odd, as it has a big bearing on their conclusion and would have been easy to test. I’m tempted to suspect that they actually did have a non-ringing condition group, but that including it made their headline effect non-significant.
Let the drool begin!