'Smartphone separation anxiety' it is not about being unable to make calls but rooted in the fact smartphones are where we store digital memories, a new study has found.
For many people posting on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter is part of how they experience life with their phones acting extensions of their being - which is why being without them can feel like losing a limb.
A study by Sungkyunkwan University and City University of Hong Kong found this condition - known as nomophobia - is only getting worse as our digital assistants being increasingly personalised.
Symptoms include being unable to turn off your phone, obsessively checking your phone, constantly topping up the battery and taking your phone to the bathroom.
'As smartphones evoke more personal memories, users extend more of their identity onto their smartphones,' researchers, led by Dr Kim Ki Joon, wrote in the paper, published in Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking.
'When users perceive smartphones as their extended selves, they are more likely to get attached to the devices, which, in turn, leads to nomophobia by heightening the phone proximity-seeking tendency', they said.
Researchers warned that this trend is likely to continue as phones carry out more and more functions.
Culled from Mailonline
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