Is Your Smartphone Making You Dumber?
Using Drops to learn 3000 words of Brazilian Portuguese in 3 weeks is one of the smartest ways I’ve used my smartphone recently!
According to a new study from the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin, that smartphone you always keep within arm’s reach may be impairing your cognitive function. Even when its powered down.
The study involved experiments with 800 different users to find out how well they were able to conduct tasks while their smartphone sat nearby.
One experiment necessitated the participant sit in front of a computer and take tests that would require their full focus in order to receive a good score. These tests would serve as a measurement for cognitive capacity, or their brain’s capability to gather and understand information. But first, the participant would be asked to put their smartphone either on the desk, inside their bag or pocket, or outside the room. They were also asked to set them to silent.
And you may guess what happened from there. The participants who chose to place their smartphone in a separate room performed better than the group with phones right on the desk or inside a bag or pocket.
While all participants likely felt they were giving full attention to the series of tests, these findings point to the possibility that even the presence of participants’ smartphones limited their brain power. Researchers say there is a linear trend which indicates that when the phone is more conspicuous, cognitive capacity goes down. The supposed simple act of ignoring the phone actually drains some of the brain’s resources.
Another experiment asked participants to self-report how dependent they felt they were on their smartphone. They then were asked to complete the same series of tests as the first experiment but were assigned at random to either place their phone on the desk, in their bag or pocket, or outside the room.
This experiment showed that the participants who reported they were most dependent scored lower when compared to those who were not so dependent, but just when they were assigned to keep their phone nearby. Not when the phone was outside the room.
The researchers also found that variables like whether the phone was facing up or down, on or off, played little part. Simply seeing the smartphone or having it easily accessible lessened the participants focus and score because part of their brain space was being used to control the urge to engage with that phone.
Even without notifications or calls coming in, the phone’s presence was enough of a distraction to limit cognitive function.
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To read the full study, click here.