Harmful effects of smartphones on children

Suppose you have visited a place or been to a concert. Do you get busy taking photos there? Or, do you start counting likes after uploading a photo on your social media account? Many people even lose their minds if they do not get enough ‘likes’ on their posts.

Scientists have named such an addiction to smartphones as “NOMOPHOBIA”. Many people suffer from this problem. Such an excessive addiction to smartphones is creating physical and mental problems alongside decreasing our productivity and creativity. 

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There is no way to deny that smartphone has made our lives easier and in some ways better. Thanks to the smartphone, many official tasks can now be done very easily from anywhere. Such examples are not rare. But when we become too much addicted to smartphones then it becomes a burden for us. We spend hours after hours without any reason.

Let us take a look at some statistics:

BankMyCell, a price comparison site, and The Guardian have published some statistics, which clearly indicate that we are going to face a serious problem.

·         Users check their smartphones 47 times on an average per day, which means they check their smartphones 17,155 times in a year. The number of touches or clicks per day is almost 2700 times.

·         85% of smartphone users use their devices while chatting with family and friends.

·         80% of smartphone users use smartphones in bed before going to sleep.

·         Users of the 18-29 years age group spend three hours on smartphones on an average per day.

This smartphone addiction is not only wasting our valuable time but also causing many physical and mental illnesses. Numerous researches have been conducted on this issue. Researchers showed that smartphone addiction reduces emotion among people, increases anger and frustration and causes insomnia.

A survey conducted in the UK showed that parents’ excessive usage of smartphones has negative impacts on family life. Children are the biggest victims of this addiction. Tablet For School, a UK-based nonprofit organization, reported that smart device addiction reduced sleep among children. Research conducted by a group of American researchers revealed that smartphone addiction hinders their mental development. It is even affecting their social and family life.

Excessive use of smartphones can cause poor vision and myopia or poor eyesight. According to the American Macular Degeneration Foundation, blue light from a smartphone screen can cause permanent damage to the retina and push it towards blindness.

Ear problems caused smartphones depend on user's habits. Listening to music at a loud volume using headphones affects the inner ear cells and causes an abnormal attitude in the brain. There is a risk of becoming deaf at some point.

Despite knowing the dangers of the excessive use of a smartphone, many conscious parents are giving smartphones to their children for spending time. Due to the availability of the internet, many children and teenagers are spending their time on social media and playing video games online. Many people are becoming completely addicted to these. For this reason, they are spending six to ten hours a day or more on smartphones. It is creating depression, loss of appetite, exhaustion and also causing harm to their studies. The excessive use of smartphones is having a negative impact on children’s mental health.

Smartphone addiction is as dangerous as drug addiction. A two-minute-long phone call causes hyperactivity in the brains of the children, which lasts in their brain for the next one hour.

The risk of heart attack increases double. The nerve of the user becomes weak. The mood becomes irritable. Blood pressure rises. The body gradually becomes tired and dull; even it disrupts sleep regularly. Radiation from the screen of a smartphone is harmful to the health of adults. It is even more harmful to children. It hampers the development of their brain.

Parents will have to play an important role to stop the excessive use of mobile phones. It is possible to reduce the tendency of children to become addicted to smartphones by giving them time, developing the habit of reading books, motivating them to do creative work, etc.

A smartphone is more than just an electronic device that allows two or more people who are geographically separated to communicate with one another. Rather, its additional features and latest technologies have made it more than a talking machine. Aside from the usual functions, smartphones can now be used to listen to FM radio, play music, take photographs, videos, send voice messages, and so on. We should ensure the proper use of our smartphones and keep them beyond the reach of the young people in our family. Thus, kids will stay out of the influence of smartphones.

Use of imagery in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is the best poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It is a long but highly enjoyable text in English literature and is read by hundreds of thousands of students around the world. This poem has remained alive since it was first published and is one of the most famous poems in English literature. In this poem, the poet S.T. Coleridge has used imagery extensively, and throughout the poem, we can find very good and skilled use of imagery. As a result of this skill of S.T. Coleridge, this poem has become even more enjoyable, and very few poems contain such artistic and grand skill of using imagery at the highest level. “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is the poem that has brought immortality to S.T. Coleridge in the history of English literature.

At times, the images used in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” are strikingly visual. “A painted ship upon a painted ocean” - when we think of these few words from this poem, we can easily imagine the ship in the ocean. The ship is colorful just like the ocean and the description is beautiful.

Coleridge has used sound images too. For example, “cracked and growled” and again when just read these three words aloud, we feel a kind of image that becomes alive in our mind.

Coleridge has drawn extensively from the Bible while using examples in this poem. “Albatross dies by a cross-bow, I beheld a something in the sky, were casting dice,” these are related to the Bible, and there is a Christian moral tone in the poem. There is the issue of crime, punishment and redemption, and God is forgiving. The main message of Jesus Christ is forgiveness, and this forgiveness has been used in a good way by Coleridge in the poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”. Coleridge was a scholar, and he studied the Bible very well.

We have seen concrete images described above, but Coleridge was good at using abstract images too. “Fear at my heart”- these four words clearly helped the readers to remember their own experiences from life about fear. The poem has some supernatural elements, and these supernatural elements have been used in a very good way with the use of images. In fact, supernatural elements have been made possible by providing good descriptions and using good images by Coleridge.

The use of imagery in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by S. T. Coleridge often helps a reader to remember the relationship between nature and super nature. Coleridge has shown the supernatural things in a very natural way, and the images often helped him a lot to do the thing.

Perhaps any discussion about the poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” will remain incomplete without talking about nature. Although Coleridge has an almost opposite and contrasting view with William Wordsworth about the role of nature in human life, he has described nature in a very good way. At times, his description of nature in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” clearly reminds us of his place as a great poet in English literature. There is a relationship between humans and nature, and “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” shows us that we cannot totally get separated from nature. We have to respect nature, and we have to love the creatures of God. To give this message, Coleridge has often used clear and concrete images like the albatross hanging on the neck of the ancient mariner. Dead men walking on the ship, and there was water everywhere, but the ancient mariner could not drink anything. All these things have a clear impact on the mind of readers, and the readers can easily imagine them in their minds.

By using images skillfully, Coleridge has created a relationship between the poem and the readers. The readers are constantly not only reading but also imagining. Poetry is the faculty of knowledge that should make our mind sharper, and by using imagery so skillfully, Coleridge has exactly done this in the poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”.