Reboot Your Life: How to avoid feeling anxious when you leave your phone at home.

By Amanda Hoh.

Do you get the feeling that something is missing when you leave your phone at home?

Do you rush to ask friends to contact you via Facebook or email instead, then rush home convinced you have missed important phone calls or texts?

Our reliance on mobile phones has extended beyond its initial design as a tool to speak to someone verbally.

Now smartphones help keep our life organised — it is our diary, a news feed, what we use to check Facebook or Twitter, the way we entertain ourselves.

Phantom phone syndrome describes the anxiety some feel when their mobile phone is not with them.

It is sometimes referred to as ringxiety or faux cell alarm.

According to psychologist Jocelyn Brewer, the scientific explanation for those feelings is the way people have been conditioned to expect something around you to vibrate.

“A lot of our notifications are intermittent — you don’t know when it’s coming, it’s not a recurrent stimulus,” she said.

“That intermittent reinforcement that you notice is not around when you don’t have your phone with you.”

Ms Brewer, who works as a psychologist in schools, has based much of her research in the psychology of technology.

She developed a concept called digital nutrition, a framework for teaching principles of a healthy and sustainable relationship to technology.

Is it bad to be so reliant on our phones?

Looking at why we depend on our phones is a healthier discussion to have rather than labelling our level of reliance as good or bad for us, Ms Brewer said.

“If you’re reliant on your phone to mediate feelings, or help relieve negative feelings by using particularly activities like mindless scrolling through visual information and social media, then that might not be so adaptive or good for you,” she said.

“It’s about your relationship with your phone or technology and how that fits into your life, rather than you fitting in with technology.”

How do we stop being so reliant on our phones?

Ms Brewer is a strong advocate for “healthy tech use” and writes on her blog that one-off “digital detoxing” strategies routinely fail.

She instead suggested people make simple changes to their technology practices to prevent overuse or reliance, such as turning off vibrate mode.

Her other tips include:

• Maintain offline interests and activities
• Use technology in moderate amounts of time
• Find time to log off or take a break
• Silence notifications by using flight mode
• Have screen-free time before bed

This post originally appeared on ABC News.

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