Have you ever been hanging out with your friends and some of them have cell phones, but others don’t? Have you ever crowded around the person with the phone? Well this has happened to me many times. I have wanted to hang out with my friends and have a good time but other people just want to sit around and watch the person with the device play games or scroll on youtube shorts.
There are very few benefits to having a phone, in my opinion all your phone really helps you with is being able to call and text people, and it helps you take pictures.
Some people may think that they need Youtube, Tiktok, or Instagram, but scrolling on those apps shortens your attention span, and disrupts your sleep. It may also affect the people around you, like I said earlier it makes it not as fun for the people you are hanging out with. Although gaming might enhance your focus, but it actually destroys some of the creativity from your brain because instead of being outside and having fun, people are inside staring at a screen all day.
I have interviewed Melissa Flick, on what she thinks about cell phone because she has three kids, and none of them have phones. Her response to the question ‘’why did you not get your children a phone?’’ was that she loves the interactions, and quality conversations that we have as a family. She sees that when she lets her kids use her phone for music, or games, they want to continuously play games or listen to music on it. She also wants them to be aware of their surroundings while they are out in public. Most importantly she wants them to have fun and play real games with their friends, such as soccer or basketball. Lastly as a mother she sees the effects of social media and how it can change a whole person’s life, and self worth.
The next question I asked her was ‘’When do you think children should be able to get a phone?’’ Her answer was Ideally in high school, because of the bigger friend groups, being farther away from home, and the risk of getting into trouble and needing to call for help.
Even though my mom thinks that children should get a phone when they are in high school, she believes that kids should get smart phones, instead of flip phones, because we can have access to quality photos, maps, and tracking.
My final question I asked her was ‘’What do you think is does to your children sitting on the phone all day?’’ Her answer was it affects your posture, reduces creativity, and exposes them to cyber bullying.
Melissa’s interview is one of the opinions of many parents with children that don’t have phones, but there are also a lot of people with children that do have phones, and they have a lot of different opinions on technology, that is why I have also interviewed my Aunt Amber Aguirre. She has three kids and all of them have phones.
She got her children a phone so they could communicate about things when they are apart, the example she used was if they are at a practice and it ends early, or if it gets canceled after she drops them off, then they will be able to communicate with each other.
The next question I asked her was ‘’Is your child on their phone a lot?’’ Her response was Yes, they are on it a lot, because instead of using the TV to watch things, they do it on their phones. She told me that now with the advanced technology people use their cell phones as personal computers.
My next question was ‘’Do you enjoy it when your child is on the phone?’’ She said that her answer was Yes, she does, because it gives her time to be alone, and relax, but it can be annoying when she needs them, but they are on their phone.
She still believes it was a good decision that she gave them a phone, because it gives her peace of mind knowing that she will be able to contact them.
After my interviews with Melissa, and Amber I have seen a lot of differences in opinions, and it was very cool to see what people thought about cell phones, and their usage.
I hope you enjoyed learning about the benefits and doubts of cell phones.
