It makes sleep harder to come by.
The gist:
Technoference, the daily intrusions and interruptions caused by digital-first living in general and your smartphone in particular, may be ruining your sleep.
Expert insight:
It's on the up-and-up, says Oscar Oviedo-Trespalacios, Ph.D., a research fellow at the Queensland University of Technology in Australia. In the pre-iPhone world of 2005, he and his team found only 2.3 percent of women and 3.2 percent of men lost sleep because of their devices. His latest study shows that today, those numbers have jumped to 19.5 and 11.8 percent, respectively.
The bottom line:
To minimize evening technoference, activate Night Shift (on the iPhone) or Night Mode (for Androids) an hour before bed, suggests Larry Rosen, Ph.D., professor emeritus of psychology at California State University, Dominguez Hills. Another way to sleep more without using your phone less, he says: Listen to a familiar playlist during your nightly routine to put you in a calm, sleep-friendly state of mind.