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Smartphone Use and Children

In: Social Issues

Submitted By melindab
Words 1788
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Smartphone Use and Children If you have a school age child then you probably have heard repeatedly, “I want a cell phone!” It used to be that we could wait until children were in high school before the topic even came up for consideration, but not anymore. Now, it is not uncommon for kids as young as 9 years old to be walking around with a smart phone in their hand. Smart phones are powerful handheld computers, which give complete unfiltered access to the internet. Having that kind of access is a tremendous responsibility. There are many advantages that owning a smartphone brings to our culture, but when it comes to children having access to their own, many disadvantages arise; therefore, any child under the age of 13 should not own one. Even though the first handheld cell phone was used in 1973, it wasn’t until 1984 that cell phones were made public. By 1990 there were 1,000,000 cell phone users. Cell phone usage in the United States has increased from 34 million to 203 million people in the last ten years. Most children own cell phones with full internet and text messaging access by middle school (Elizabeth Englander). Everywhere you go you can see a kid with a cell phone and they are using them for more than just making phone calls. About three in four (74%) of teens ages 12-17 are mobile internet users who say they access the internet on cell phones, tablets or other mobile devices. Cell phone ownership among teens has been stable since 2011, but smartphone ownership has grown considerably. Some 78% of teens now have a cell phone and almost half (47%) of those say they have smartphones. That translates to 37% of all teens who have smartphones by comparison to 45% of adults who own one (Pew Research Center). According to a recent study by Verizon, the average age that a child receives their first cell phone is 11 1/2. Verizon also surveyed 519

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