Stressing Over Double Texts

In the United States, 237.72 million people use a cell phone. 13% of cell owners pretended to be using their phone in order to avoid interacting with the people around them. 42% have had trouble doing something because they did not have their phone nearby. (Statistics from Pew Research Center.) We don’t think of electronics much. They’re just kinda… there. We wake up to them and fall asleep to them. We eat lunch with them and go to class with them. Most of us spend more time on our phone them we do with people.
Most of us have forgotten how to communicate without a phone. We scroll through Instagram while having a conversation. We text during family meals. ‘Hanging out with friends’ means sitting there on your phone with a movie in the background. We have drama on them. It is so much easier to say something to a screen than to a human. You can’t see the person’s face when they see the message. You can’t say exactly what you mean because there is no tone. You can tell people what you want to say so much easier. But what no one realizes is, that’s not a good thing.

Most people don’t realize our life without them.

Stressing over double texts is the norm. Going to class without one is insanity. Sending a blunt text isn’t over thought. It's just sent. I’ve been on all four sides of this, and in all honesty, i think we all have, intentionally or not. Sending good, receiving good, sending out of context or blunt texts, and getting them back. It’s stressful. It's ironic how a tiny belonging can put so much pain in someone’s life. In case you haven’t noticed this isn’t about me. Its being on the receiving end of someone who has stayed up all night waiting for a text back, ranting on and on about something that seems trivial; but to them, it isn’t. When you take a step back and realize that one text caused them a world of pain, and think that this all would have been avoided if that one statement- that never would have been said face to face- would have never been

sent.
When you are on your phone or iPad, or computer you don't feel addicted you could walk away whenever right? Most psychologists suggest that using our iPhones may tap into the same associative learning pathways in the brain that make other compulsive behaviors — like gambling — so addictive. As with addiction to drugs or cigarettes or food, the chemical driver of this process is the feel-good neurotransmitter dopamine. I know cigarettes and alcohol are bad for me. We learned about it for 3 years in middle school health. More people own a cell phone then smoke cigarettes, and I know that my cell phone won't give me lung cancer. But how sad do they make teenagers? I use sad for lack of better term, but it fits. I asked some of my closer friends what they thought it. All of them agreed. That at least some point in the past month, they either got mad or angry because of their phone. Now that’s just 5 people but it’s 100% of 5 people.
I am not saying go throw your phone away. They are important and helpful. I wish that everyone could realize, I guess what phones actually do, and what they are. You can ruin a life at the push of a button, but you could also make a day.