Your heart starts beating faster, faster, faster, faster! You frantically search your pockets and belongings. Nothing. You retrace your steps. Nothing. Then you realize…you have no idea where your phone is..

Today, in our phone centric world, this sensation  has been clinically titled Nomophobia.

Nomophobia is a proposed name for the phobia (intense, irrational fear) of being out of mobile phone contact. No-more-phone phobia. Many teens under the age of 18 cannot imagine a world without phones. Most teens use that proposed name for the phobia of being out of mobile phone contact.

“Horrified”, Ella Simpson, 7th grader at ROMS, said when asked how would she feel if she lost her phone.

According to research by Kashfia Nehrin Rahman, a high school science student from South Dakota, 92 percent of the teens kept their phones on all the time, and 73 percent said they became anxious when their phones had no charge. The teens her study checked their phones about once every 23 minutes, and 37 percent said they used their phones while driving.

Kashfia’s findings may sound familiar to anyone who’s forgotten his or her phone at home all day. Without their phones, the teens had higher blood pressure and heart rates, leading Kashfia to conclude that not having a smartphone around was stressful for them.

Driving and texting can be a deadly experience on the road. If teens are easily able to talk about how the text and drive even if they can get a fine or possibly criminal charges in some states. Who says they won’t disobey school rules and use their phones in the middle of class. Though the teacher repeatedly says  their is a no cellphone policy in their classroom.

But for 7th grader Kevin Martinez this is not a problem, Kevin is phoneless. Kevin lives his everyday life as a nightmare to other teens. Still teens with phones say the the same thing as teens without phones when asked, “What would you do without a phone and what do you do to pass time?”

Jasmine Mitchell, 7th grader at ROMS, who had a phone since she was six. It seems as if, Jasmine could not step in Kevin’s shoes even if she wanted too.

Despite the fact that Nomophobia can cause insomnia, stress, anxiety, and depression. Nomophobia can still have some positive impacts on you and your life. Such as opportunity to learn new things, ease of using several applications, getting exposed on a global scale, and social responsibility and personality development.

It is in people’s hands to do what’s best for them. No one can tell them what to do or force them to do something they don’t like. Smartphones can be excellent means of communication. Teens should wisely choose to make the best of the smartphones rather than becoming too much succumbed to the development and usage of smartphones and its applications.