Using Smartphone in the Bathroom? Research Shows That Most of Us Do
A recent study by Bank My Cell shows which sex and which generations use the phones most when sitting on the toilet. Spoiler: the winners are, of course, the millennials.
According to a survey conducted by Bank My Cell on a group of 2114 people between June 1 and August 21, 2018, 80% of men and 69% of women sitting on the toilet use their phones. Regardless of gender, the most toilet and smartphone-focued generation are of course those born in the 80's and 90's - the millennials. As much as 90% of them lock themselves in the ceramic temple of solitude with a phone in their hands. As far as the operating system is concerned, the group of bathroom users of Android is by 12% bigger than those with iOS.
Less digitized groups are the X Generation, which includes those born between the mid-1960s and early 1980s (82%), and the group commonly referred to in the US as "boomers" - people born during the baby boom between 1946 and 1964. Only 52% of them use their phones when heeding the nature's call.
TEN MINUTES IS ENOUGH.
Make sure that browsing or playing does not cause your visit to extend from 5 or 10 minutes to half an hour - sitting too long can (but does not have to!) affect the development of hemorrhoids and, in the long run, lead to some "difficulties", so to speak. You can read about it in a super-cringy interview with Dr. Gregory Thorkelson from the University of Pittsburgh - oh, here. Or you can go buy an ointment for literal butthurt right away.
In the first half of the 20th century, when Freud's thesis was still a breath of fresh air, reading on the toilet was considered by some researchers as a sign of trauma in early childhood. That's how you make a complicated theory out of a simple action, huh? This act was supposed to bring balance to the ego by, you know, getting rid of matter. And reading is was considered an intake apparently. In other words, one goes in, another goes out, the balance is preserved, we are healthy. Sounds reasonable.
Today we know that there is no evidence of this - everything is fine with you if you're doing this. It is worth noting, however, that while reading is rather relaxing and therefore healthy, performing stressful activities on the phone (and on the toilet) - not necessarily. Bacteria remain a problem - including the famous frequenter of toilets with a beautifully sounding Latin name E. coli. Already eight years ago, there was publicity in the media about studies confirming that one in six phones in the UK is carrying the germ. There is little chance that this number had decreased since then, but it is difficult to expect users to disinfect their phones regularly.
Bank My Cell's research findings can be used to try to draw a whole lot of conclusions, including addictions to information and smartphones, or the degeneration of human civilization (because why the heck not?). However, there is much to suggest that being in the toilet is simply one of the few moments of the day when we can also do something that is not related to work or other duties. A natural pretext for wasting time.
