Welcome to the generation of “digital amnesia” where your brain is losing the ability to remember rapidly as we rely on technology to retain data. Smartphones are influencing technology nowadays, it has a lot of great value for humanity but they also cause harm to our brain.
Cyber security company Kaspersky Lab conducted a survey of 6,000 mobile phone users. Surprisingly, it found that 71 percent of them can’t remember the phone numbers of their children and 87 percent can’t recollect the numbers of their children’s schools as well. For some respondents, losing their smartphones will make them forget what they have been doing.
The connection between smartphones and the human brain
Distraction is one of the key factors that make memories difficult to form. When we multitask on our smartphones and quickly search for information across multiple apps and notifications, we only half focus on learning a new skill. Therefore, the information is likely to be stored in our short-term memory.
Smartphone addiction can also disrupt sleep as we need deep sleep to detoxify our daily brain trash. Only when we are in deep sleep, does the brain synaptically respond and make room for new information by removing old information. When we disrupt sleep, we prevent synaptic pruning from occurring, affecting our ability to retain new information and disturb forming new memories. Since our brain doesn’t have to work hard to get the information, we don’t store it either.
With smartphones, you have a whole encyclopedia and beyond of information at your fingertips at any point in time. But this results in a much more superficial or shallow way to access information. – Dr. Kaufer
How could you avoid these problems?
You don’t have to give up completely on your mobile phone the important thing is to be mindful of how you use your phone. Altogether to improve your brain health. and prioritize other activities participate in ‘in-person interactions’ whenever possible
Some people find it helpful to delete social media apps or download software that limits their time. It can be helpful to increase time for reading a book or working on a hobby. When you’re shrinking on your mental clarity, sanity can be enough motivation to maintain it.
• Ensure that you do not use your mobile phone and keep it out of your reach before going to sleep.
• Disable unusual notifications and uninstall all non-essential applications.
• Observe a screen-free day at least one day a week. On this day, try to avoid using phones for anything else other than making or receiving important calls.
• If you want to do something radical to get rid of Smartphone addiction, get a landline or feature phone.
• Potential risks to the brain can be minimized by using headphones or loudspeakers while calling, especially when the network quality is low and the mobile phone is operating at its full potential.
