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M: Good evening, everybody. Nomophobia is a term we came across when preparing our next story. It’s an abbreviation for no-mobile-phone-phobia, the fear of not having your smartphone or being connected with others through it. Though the devices are a relatively recent invention, an increasing number of people seemed to have developed a psychological dependence on them, and that’s getting researchers’ attention. Today, we invite Laurie Segall, Connetch senior technology correspondent to join us.
    W: Thank you, host. It’s been 10 years since the iPhone debut and it’s hard to imagine a world without the smartphone. We use our smartphones to work, entertain, organize, do hundreds of daily tasks, even find love. We might jokingly say I’m addicted to my smartphone. But more and more researchers are starting to agree.
    M: So, think back to life without a smartphone.
    W: Was there life without a smartphone? There’s no widely adopted diagnosis of smartphone addiction, but for doctors, not having an official diagnosis doesn’t mean it isn’t real.
    M: I’m still amazed at how many people do dismiss it as a silly idea— even plenty of people in my own field.
    W: For those who specialize in technology addictions, what goes on inside your head— looks similar to what goes on inside your head when you’re dealing with other addictions.
    M: The regions of the brain that light up when engaged into your smartphone are the same regions of the brain that are engaged when you’re using those drugs and alcohol, is that true?
    W: Correct. In other words, you’re using it like a drug— when you’re triggered by burden, you’re using it as an avoidance of sleep. You’re using it to increase your mood when you’re feeling a little down, or you’re using it to avoid social situations when you walk into a party.
    M: But it takes a trained professional to tell you if you’re addicted to your phone. Self-diagnosing won’t work, will it?
    W: Yes. That’s because we’re terrible at estimating how much time we actually spend online. A 2015 study found that people use their phones twice as much as they think they do. You know, I actually think as human beings, we have less control than we think, right? Because we’re kind of— we realize we’re reaching to our phone all the time but we don’t know why.
    M: And I met a guy named Scott Dunlap. And he was fascinating. He spent much of his career building apps and using metrics to get us more addicted to our smartphones.
    W: The notifications that you get... there’s reason they come at a certain time. The words that are chosen in there— every character of that has been AB tested for you and your personality type. What we were in was the science of understanding what makes a product addictive.
    M: Over 77 percent of Americans now own a smartphone. That’s almost double since 2011. What is clear is that our relationship with our phones is changing. How we use phones in 2007 looks a lot different from life in 2017.
    W: Yes, quite differently. Normative use would be use that doesn’t impact anything in your life. In other words, you use it to make a phone call. You use it for your GPS. You don’t have it on the table when you’re eating your dinner. You’re using it but you’re using it very moderately. Now, there are less and less people that are doing that.
    M: Yes. Thank you for sharing your views with us.
    6. What is this interview mainly about?
    7. Why does the man make an analogy between smartphones and drugs?
    8. Why is self-diagnosing of Nomophobia impossible?
    9. How many people in the USA own a smartphone nowadays?
    10. What is normative use of smartphones?