Abstract
BackgroundMounting evidence shows that smartphone usage heavily disrupts our work life and social activities. Moreover, it is possible that overuse could resemble addictive tendencies. A key contributing factor to smartphone overuse seems to be usage of the messaging application WhatsApp. Although WhatsApp is one of the most commonly used communication applications on smartphones, research in this area is scarce. Given the huge societal debate on the impact of smartphone usage on our daily lives, the present study undertook a large-scale investigation in order to provide numbers on smartphone usage generally—and use of WhatsApp in particular, with the aim of providing a basis for a scientific debate.MethodsIn a large sample of N = 2,418 users, we recorded WhatsApp behaviour over a 4 week period.ResultsOur data show that use of WhatsApp accounted for 19.83% (= 32.11 min) of all smartphone behaviour (compare: Facebook only 9.38% = 15.19 min). The mean of general daily smartphone usage was 161.95 min. Females used WhatsApp for significantly longer periods of time than males and younger age was associated with longer duration of WhatsApp use. While the personality trait Extraversion was positively associated with daily WhatsApp use, Conscientiousness showed an inverse correlation with the length of daily WhatsApp use.ConclusionsThe numbers on smartphone usage in the present study show that the smartphone dominates our daily life. In particular WhatsApp is a driving force, here. Given the length of daily smartphone and WhatsApp usage, more studies need to be conducted to better understand smartphone usage.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13104-015-1280-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Mounting evidence shows that smartphone usage heavily disrupts our work life and social activities
Education was negatively associated with daily smartphone usage, but not significantly associated with WhatsApp usage
Age was not associated with general daily smartphone usage (r = −.01, p = .56), but was inversely linked to daily WhatsApp usage (r = −.33, p < .001; compared with rho = −.41, p < .001)
Summary
Mounting evidence shows that smartphone usage heavily disrupts our work life and social activities. WhatsApp is a communication app facilitating the exchange of instant messages, pictures, videos and voice calls via an Internet connection, which has been installed on smartphones over half a billion times all round the world [8].a It represents one of the most important features of a smartphone, as it enables easy communication via text or voice messages between two or more persons. WhatsApp is attractive as, after installing the app, the sending and receipt of messages is cost free (in contrast to the original text message function on mobile phones) The latter feature (cost free) clearly explains the success of WhatsApp. In addition, its function across different smartphone types (Apple, Android, etc.) and its international functionality are important contributors to this popularity
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