{"id":1576,"date":"2011-09-06T22:23:40","date_gmt":"2011-09-07T03:23:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mindonmed.com\/?p=1576"},"modified":"2011-09-16T13:57:04","modified_gmt":"2011-09-16T18:57:04","slug":"cell-phone-addiction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/2011\/09\/cell-phone-addiction.html","title":{"rendered":"Compulsive Phone Checking?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Good<\/a>
California Sunrise - Tuesday, 8\/30<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It’s 9:30am on a gorgeous, albeit scorching hot, morning in Rancho Mirage, California and I’m leaving a group lecture on the family dynamics of addiction at a world-renowned addiction treatment facility. As if it’s been magnetically cued I find my right hand patting the rear pocket of my jeans in search of an iPhone.<\/p>\n

It’s not there.<\/em><\/p>\n

After looking around to make sure no one watched me patting my own rear I am awe struck at the fact that, for no reason at all and without thinking about it, I compulsively reached for my cell phone.<\/p>\n

As many of you know I just returned from a week long medical student program at The Betty Ford Center<\/a> where I was taught about addiction from lectures by world-famous experts and through immersion into their patient treatment program. The center, with great reason, does not allow cell phones on campus and on Monday morning I suddenly found myself connection-less for the first time in years. I remembered an article<\/a> I had read on CNN not long ago that discussed the addictive nature of smartphone checking.<\/p>\n

So, there I am in the middle of a drug and alcohol addiction treatment center finding myself addicted to my phone. Or, as the article and this research paper<\/a> suggest, addicted to checking – a repetitive behavior eerily similar to the training method I used to teach Wrigley to give me a high five.<\/p>\n

\"High<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong> Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong> Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong> Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong> Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong> Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong> Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. Behavior. TREAT!<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

An email essentially becomes a dog\u00a0treat<\/em>. Still with me?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s not hard to see how this could distracting enough to affect your real-life interactions and productivity.<\/p>\n

“Dad said I can’t wear foil antennas and stick my fork in a socket while standing in that puddle of water. Can I pleeeeeeeease?”
\n…mustcheckphone-couldbeexciting*…
\n<\/strong>“Sure honey, eat your lunch first.”<\/em><\/p>\n

So, how do we stop?<\/h3>\n

\"Cell<\/a>Not unlike AA and other 12-Step programs the article suggests that the first step to stopping this behavior is recognizing that you’re doing it. Honestly, even after reading that article (before I was forced phone-less last week) I didn’t realize how often I was checking my phone in the course of a day. I think being aware of this has helped some, because it now seems I’m not mindlessly looking at it ad nauseum for no conscious reason. Now, I just check my phone somewhere in the vicinity of 40 times a day and think about checking it, but stop myself, an additional 35.<\/p>\n

Baby steps, right?<\/h3>\n

Anyone else finding themselves checking their phone for no reason other than pure compulsive behavior?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Image: Ambro \/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net<\/a><\/p>\n

Quote from hilarious\u00a0Oatmeal Comic<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s 9:30am on a gorgeous, albeit scorching hot, morning in Rancho Mirage, California and I’m leaving a group lecture on the family dynamics of addiction at a world-renowned addiction treatment facility. As if it’s been magnetically cued I find my right hand patting the rear pocket of my jeans in search of an iPhone. It’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[82,132],"tags":[175,174,185,189,190,186,176,188,187],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/Screen-shot-2011-09-06-at-10.02.57-PM.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1576"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1576"}],"version-history":[{"count":38,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1621,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1576\/revisions\/1621"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mindonmed.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}