How often do you use your smartphone?
There are a number of countries that are considered the ‘most wired’, meaning a large percentage of the population has broadband connectivity. (Norway, Sweden, Iceland, and Finland), but mobile broadband penetration (defined as the number of mobile broadband subscriptions per 100 people) is a different story, and South Korea, at 106% (when people have multiple subscriptions, the number can exceed 100%) is among the highest (Singapore – 123% & Japan – 113% are higher) while still having the highest ‘wired’ population in Asia.
This combination would lead one to expect high smartphone usage, and it is just that. A study by the Korea Information Society Development Institute indicated that South Korean individuals used media of some sort every 15 minutes, and 1 in 4 continued that practice while watching television or reading books. To make matters worse, 27.7% of those surveyed were using other forms of media while holding a smartphone, although 90% of the almost 10,000 people sampled indicated that they considered the smartphone to be ‘subsidiary media’.
In the US the average adult (18+) spends 2 hours, 51 minutes on their smartphones every day (11.875% of a 24 hour day and 16.76% of a normal day, for those lucky enough to get 7 hours of sleep. But that’s the conservative view, with other studies[1] stating the average at 4 hours, 5 minutes/day (17% and 24% using the same parameters) although it also includes tablet usage, and that has been increasing each year for the last 5 years, albeit at a slower rate than in previous years. The scary test would be for adolescents or children below the age of 18…
[1] eMarketer 2016
This combination would lead one to expect high smartphone usage, and it is just that. A study by the Korea Information Society Development Institute indicated that South Korean individuals used media of some sort every 15 minutes, and 1 in 4 continued that practice while watching television or reading books. To make matters worse, 27.7% of those surveyed were using other forms of media while holding a smartphone, although 90% of the almost 10,000 people sampled indicated that they considered the smartphone to be ‘subsidiary media’.
In the US the average adult (18+) spends 2 hours, 51 minutes on their smartphones every day (11.875% of a 24 hour day and 16.76% of a normal day, for those lucky enough to get 7 hours of sleep. But that’s the conservative view, with other studies[1] stating the average at 4 hours, 5 minutes/day (17% and 24% using the same parameters) although it also includes tablet usage, and that has been increasing each year for the last 5 years, albeit at a slower rate than in previous years. The scary test would be for adolescents or children below the age of 18…
[1] eMarketer 2016
US Mobile Users - Average Time Spent/Day - Source: www.eMarketer.com
Other studies [1]pinpoint what we do on our phones, with 5.3% of time spent on e-mails and 13.4% spent on texts, and the number 1 alarm clock is a smartphone. Of course, pollsters do not consider this kind of use a compulsion but a massive cultural shift and those in the smartphone supply chain feel that the change in daily behavior is a good one, with our youth having grown up on the technology rather than adapting to it. Does this point to world where eyes can only focus on short distances and fingers grow points to make texting more accurate, or will AI make us a population that wanders the streets speaking to our smartphones..? (”Is he talking to me?”) Probably not because the next generation will be even more tied into their smartphones, with digital assistants managing their lives and speaking to chat bots to solve problems, giving users more free time…and pigs will fly!
[1] Nielsen
[1] Nielsen
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