Smartphones and psychosocial development: Self-compassion mediates the association between trait anxiety and smartphone attachment in digital natives but not digital immigrants

ABSTRACT

Cyberpsychological research suggests that interaction with and use of smartphones influences personal wellbeing and psychosocial development. Studies indicate that (a) the ways in which individuals manage their attachment to devices influences personal development, (b) greater smartphone attachment is associated with higher anxiety levels, and (c) personality differences might mediate this association. We investigated whether self-compassion (i.e. being kind and non-judgmental to oneself) might be such a mediating factor, and whether this mediational relationship differed between digital natives (n = 104, 18–25 years) and digital immigrants (n = 117, 30–60 years). Participants completed standardised scales measuring trait anxiety, self-compassion, and smartphone attachment/use. The mediational hypothesis was confirmed for digital natives only, suggesting that among these participants (who reported significantly higher anxiety levels) higher levels of self-compassion can provide a healthy buffer between psychological distress and unhealthy smartphone attachment. We conclude that programmatic self-compassion interventions could buffer negative developmental consequences of unhealthy smartphone attachment.

KEYWORDS:

• Anxiety
• attachment
• psychosocial development
• self-compassion
• smartphones

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Emerging adulthood is a developmental phase that stretches from late adolescence until approximately the age of 25 (Arnett 2000).

2 This study avoids casting frequent cellphone use as an ‘addiction’, because this rhetoric has negative and possibly stigmatising implications. Furthermore, any statement that individuals who use their phones regularly are ‘addicts’ implies that smartphones are exclusively bad, and neglects their beneficial aspects (see, e.g., Ahn & Jung 2014; Stern & Burke Odland 2017).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by DST-NRF Centre of Excellence in Human Development: [Grant Number OPP2019-4IRHD-4].