Researchers in Finland, US say adjustments, flexibility are necessary to live without smartphone

• Published date: 12 April 2024
• Author: JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
• Publication title: Jerusalem Post, The: Web Edition Articles (Israel)

In a world where more and more services and social interaction are based on mobile apps, a smartphone has become close to a necessity. Despite this, some people avoid smartphones and instead use a dumbphone – an anachronistic technology is an unusual choice when many government systems, business services, and interpersonal relationships make use of the diverse communication methods presented by smartphones. However, dumbphones are being increasingly (re)adopted by individuals seeking, among other motivations, a low-distraction digital handset

New research from Aalto University in Finland and the US has investigated why some people choose not to use smartphones and what the consequences are. They published the results of their interviews with eight traditional dumbphone users, five designer dumbphone users, and two designer dumbphone developers. Their findings highlight both the impact of the digital disconnection movement and dumbphones as tools for mental and physical health, practicing religious devotion, and enacting political disaffiliation.

The study, which appears in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction under the title "Swapping 5G for 3G: Motivations, experiences, and implications of contemporary dumbphone adoption," is based on interviews with participants who chose to give up their smartphones or never had one—a decision that can make daily life more burdensome, limit choices, and sometimes even increase risks.

'Custom dumbphones can be expensive, and some of the European participants had even ordered phones from Africa that weren't available on the domestic market,' said Prof. Janne Lindqvist, who heads the university's computer science department.

The participants all came from countries and social surroundings where smartphones were available and the obvious choice. Their reasons for turning them down varied. Some wanted to get away from the distractions a smartphone unavoidably causes, while others wanted to avoid online surveillance. For parents of under-age children, the main reasons were a desire to keep their offspring away from social media and to avoid the temptation of a smartphone interrupting time with their kids.

Choices were made due to religious reasons

For a few, there...