Attention parents!! Mobile phones or smartphones can be harmful for your children. Know these effects of mobile phones.

We are living in a technology era and there is literally no doubt about people utilizing technology to make their easy. Some of these advanced technologies are mobile phones or cell phones, laptops, PCs, tablets and notepads, etc.  Today let us talk about mobile or smartphones. Initially there were simple headsets or buttoned phones whereas with the advancement of technology, these got replaced with button less or touch screen smart phones.  There are definitely multiple advantages of mobile phones such as making our life and work easier, calls to distant relatives and family became affordable and a touch away, work presentations and video, photos, social media presence became much easier than ages before, and what not!!! 

Although there are benefits, there are harms too.  Mobile phones emit radiation which are harmful to human body. Besides affecting our health, it can affect other areas of our life also.  Especially in this modern age, we know that the children are becoming fonder of mobile phones. In fact as soon as they reach their 5^th standard or class, they start demanding a smartphone to their parents for their personal use.  Children are in one way getting obsessed to the phones to the extent of causing harm to themselves. They are innocent and likely to be ignorant of some of the bad effects of mobile overuse. It is their parents’ responsibility to guide their kids/children and inform them about the potential hazards they would have to suffer if they overuse the phones.

What are the bad effects of mobile phone on your children?

The 10 bad effects of Mobile or Smartphone use can be:

1. Health hazard: Radiation is emitted from the phones as well the towers used for transmitting the radiation. These radiations are found to be very damaging and hazardous for our brain. The brains of kids are delicate or underdeveloped than adults and so the kids are at more risk of getting rare brain tumor. It can be a benign or non-cancerous tumor or growth; it can be a cancerous tumor growth.  There are other fatal effects on the cognition and thought processes of your child.  It can affect the organs of central nervous system.

2.Harmful to the eyes: Constant starring at the screen of the phones for prolonged hours often leads to visual difficulties. There are chances of your kids getting early eye glasses due to sight problems.  Nowadays the children are more into playing video games online and they are so much engrossed in playing that they even don’t blink their eyes for a second. This leads to the drying of cornea and irritation causing red eye.  There is difficulty in seeing far objects and the ocular tension of the eyes also rise up causing further damage to the inner eye mainly, the retina.  If this continues for long, your children might end up losing eyesight. Blindness can be one of the most fatal consequence of mobile addiction.

3. Ear Damage: Use of mobile phones for talking to friends for prolonged hours may be a potential threat for your children’s ears. If your child is a loud music lover then he is undoubtedly at a major risk of having ear or hearing problems in the near future.  Ear infections can also occur if they constantly use the ear phones. Ear phones are often loaded with germs and the constant use may cause your sweat to lead those germs into the ear and you get infections of ear, mainly fungal or bacterial in origin.

4.Source of infections: We use our mobile phones too much and there are indefinitely millions of germs or microbes present on the screen of the phones.  When your child is addicted to the phone, he or she forgets to wash the hands and they consume their meals. This lets the microbes or germs enter the alimentary canal and cause infection in the body.

5.Inactivity and or obesity: Today we see a lot of kids busy digging their eyes into their mobile phones. While most of the parent buy them this trouble with their hands, other children often snatch away their parents’ phones on opportunity. They start playing games or watching videos or movies. This may continue for hours or a couple of hours or even more. This may cause to increase the weight of your child. Children do not play outdoor games and so become less active and unhealthy. Such children are sedentary and gain weight rapidly which further aggravates their health condition.  Obesity is the major risk factor of some of the most common non communicable diseases such as diabetes, heart problems, etc.

6.Uncontrolled behaviour: Overuse of smartphones make children stubborn. They do not listen their parents and start showing behaviours like irritability, denial, aggression, depression, anxiety, obsession and compulsion and manic changes. Children yell or shout when they are separated from their phones. While eating also, they use their phones and they take their phones to the toilet too. There are kids who sleep with their phones. When these symptoms last for long, it may even cause changes in the mental health status of the children.  It can cause insomnia, anxiety, depression and phobia in children.

7. Access to unsafe content on the internet: While we talk about smartphones, the term internet must accompany. Kids are more talented nowadays to use the internet facility on the mobile phones. There is a lot of adult content on the web that can come forward when the children use their phones. This may create a negative effect on their minds at a tender age and they may even fall prey to love traps or cybercrime.

8.Social Media usage effects: Children are more attracted towards the social media such as instagram, facebook, Whatsapp messenger, etc. and these platforms actually keep them more engaged or busy with their phones.  Not everything that looks good is good. Too much use of social media may actually cause negative effects on their minds and they may get easily offended by the negative comments or disrespect online.  This may lead to depression, anxiety and social crimes, violence, verbal abuse, etc. Online fraud with playing games and using other application is also a disadvantage of it, which can be faced by your children.

9. Effect on the performance at studies: Your child, if addicted to the mobile phone may actually pay little or no interest at all in the studies. Many children who have their own phones, carry them to their school and message or play games while the teachers are teaching. This may lead to lack of attention to the studies resulting into a weak or poor performance at studies.  Many students either fail or drop out from the school saying that they don’t want to study.

10. Communication gap with the family: Once being addicted to the smartphones or mobile, the children try to find solace in the small world of the cell and this separates them from the real life. Children start to hide things from parents, start telling lies and even talk too less with the family members. It is like living under same roof but not sharing a bit.  This increases the worries of parents and they start taking stress about their child’s future.

Mobile technology is not a bad one. It is rather convenient and easy to use but every technology has limitations and disadvantages. Too much use or reckless use or over addiction can prove to be harmful. Especially, the children ranging from school-going to teenagers age are at more risk. The reason is they are attracted towards the mobile phones more, but not knowing how to use it within limits and while taking care of their health. It is solely a parent’s responsibility to guide and explain their children about the harmful effects of using mobile phones.