My canine mates and I would nominate owner-distraction as the major issue at the next election, if only we could vote.
It got a lot worse during COVID-19 when so many humans, stuck at home, decided to buy a dog for company, then ignored the dog in favour of the mobile phone.
The Boss read me a piece from National Geographic saying one in 10 children have been diagnosed with ADHD – it stands for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder – and the adults are catching up at 6.8 per cent – well up from 4.4 per cent in 2003, before the smartphone arrived.
A study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association shows that frequent digital media use involving social media, gaming, texting, and streaming movies, music or TV increases one's risk of developing ADHD symptoms by nearly 10 per cent.
Naturally, the scientists are reluctant to ascribe this rapid growth solely to technology use, on the grounds that ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterised as a person having difficulties with inattentiveness, hyperactivity/lack of impulse control, or both.
This all sounds like The Boss to me. He protests that it’s a serious condition that often comes with other problems. Well, I can tell you about a few of those too!
He told me the mark of a smartphone addict is if they take the phone to bed and assured me he doesn’t do that – but the Missus overheard and pointed out that the iPad usually goes with him.That got him on the back foot.
“It doubles as my Kindle,” he muttered. “And I do like to read the papers in the morning.” But he was in trouble here.
The truth is, I need to straighten him out: he’s drifting towards the abyss.
For years he’s chuckled about all the people on their phones at restaurants and cafes instead of talking to each other, not to mention drivers still stopped at traffic lights looking at their phones after the lights change and people bumping into each other on the footpath or nearly getting run over for the same reason.
Then there’s the endless “here I am” selfies of travellers recording their every meal for posterity, which also saves talking to each other; and the odd luckless soul who backs off a cliff while taking one. I fear The Boss is becoming one of them.
The other day he was complaining about the way Instagram keeps sending entertaining videos to him when he’s looking for fishing knots. I gave him this advice: turn off notifications, fix a time each day to look at social media (if you must) and have a no-phone rule when you’re with friends and family. And that includes your dog. Woof!
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