'They can't stop themselves': How compulsive smartphone use is like an addiction
Anita Hagh couldn't stop pressing the corner of her phone screen where the Facebook app used to be.
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It was about five years ago, and she had deleted the social media platform from her cellphone.
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It was like muscle memory, she says, having clicked on the app countless times so she could scroll for hours through random online groups.
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She realized she had been losing out on sleep while scrolling and made the difficult decision to delete the app.
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'After deleting it, I was very much thinking it was still there, kind of like a phantom limb situation,' said the 28-year-old post-doctoral researcher at McGill University's department of integrated studies in education.
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Hagh, who is researching the addictive nature of social media, said she believes she was likely experiencing what's called 'problematic smartphone use' or phone addiction.
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Jay Olson, a post-doctoral researcher in the University of Toronto's psychology department, led a 2023 global study that surveyed more than 50,000 people about their smartphone habits.
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He said it's an emerging problem.
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'Normal smartphone use would become problematic when it starts negatively affecting your daily life and in different ways,' said Olson.
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'It might make you feel depressed. It might be interfering with your sleep or your concentration.'
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Some young adults are showing symptoms of problematic smartphone use, Olson said, as they've never seen a world without phones or have spent most of their lives with the devices.
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'(They) haven't grown up using smartphones and social media for the majority of their free time throughout the day,' he said.
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Venture Academy, a private school for troubled teens with locations in Barrie, Ont., and Red Deer, Alta., offers treatment for problems including 'electronic addiction.'
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Gary Su, a clinical therapist with the school, said in an interview from Calgary that smartphone use has made the lives of many of his young clients more complex.
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'We are seeing a very unique phenomenon,' he said. 'Things seem to be a lot more volatile or more extreme. Kids are exposed to things just way too early for their age. And it's harder to trace, because everything online is anonymous.'
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