Cellular telephone use during free-living walking significantly reduces average walking speed.

Jacob E. Barkley,Andrew Lepp

doi:10.1186/s13104-016-2001-y

Abstract

BackgroundCellular telephone (cell phone) use decreases walking speed in controlled laboratory experiments and there is an inverse relationship between free-living walking speed and heart failure risk. The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of cell phone use on walking speed in a free-living environment.MethodsSubjects (n = 1142) were randomly observed walking on a 50 m University campus walkway. The time it took each subject to walk 50 m was recorded and subjects were coded into categories: cell phone held to the ear (talking, n = 95), holding and looking at the cell phone (texting, n = 118), not visibly using the cell phone (no use, n = 929).ResultsSubjects took significantly (p < 0.001) longer traversing the walkway when talking (39.3 s) and texting (37.9 s) versus no use (35.3 s).ConclusionAs was the case with the previous laboratory experiments, cell phone use significantly reduces average speed during free-living walking.

Highlights

Cellular telephone use decreases walking speed in controlled laboratory experiments and there is an inverse relationship between free-living walking speed and heart failure risk
Excessive cell phone use has been linked with an increased incidence of traffic accidents, elevated anxiety, lack of sleep, poor academic performance and lower cardiorespiratory fitness [2, 4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12]
We have reported an inverse relationship between cell phone use and cardiorespiratory fitness and a positive relationship between cell phone use and sedentary behavior [5, 13]

Summary

Introduction

Cellular telephone (cell phone) use decreases walking speed in controlled laboratory experiments and there is an inverse relationship between free-living walking speed and heart failure risk. 98 % of young adults own a cellular/mobile telephone (cell phone) and they use these devices heavily (>4 h day−1) [1]. Excessive cell phone use has been linked with an increased incidence of traffic accidents, elevated anxiety, lack of sleep, poor academic performance and lower cardiorespiratory fitness [2, 4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12]. Taken together these findings indicate that excessive cell phone use may be considered a negative health behavior

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