Track Your Screen Time

Quick WIn

Examine your smartphone usage and consider limiting your screen time with the help of tracking apps.

Try This Today

• Take a quiz. You may not think your screen time is excessive, but many of us don’t realize how long we’re on our devices. The Center for Internet and Technology Addiction developed the Digital Distraction Test, which can alert users to patterns and signs that they may not have noticed.
• Do a time audit. Set your alarm to go off every 30 minutes for an entire morning or afternoon, and write down what you’re doing each time it rings. That’ll give you a real-time look at how you spend your time: Are you engaging with people, focusing on work or a hobby, or scrolling through social media? Once you determine your distractions, you’ll know what to cut back on.
• Monitor your screen time. Look at your daily and weekly phone-usage statistics to see which apps you use the most and how much time you spend on them. If you’re unhappy with the results, screen-time-tracking apps, such as Moment, ScreenZen and Flipd, can encourage you to limit your usage and meet a reduced daily goal.
• Choose apps wisely. Ask yourself if the apps that you use most often put you in the right frame of mind. People feel happy after using meditation, weather and music apps (which don’t typically encourage excessive usage) but unhappy after using social media and game apps, especially after engaging for longer periods, according to a study published in 2018 of 200,000 iPhone uses by the Center for Humane Technology.

Why

We use our devices for important, practical reasons, but many of us stay glued to our phones and other electronics for far too long. According to the Pew Research Center’s analysis of the 2014-2017 American Time Use Survey, adults ages 60 and up spent, on average, more than four hours staring at screens each day in the mid-2010s. Daily screen time among older adults had risen by nearly 30 minutes compared the previous decade. Shaving off some of those hours on screens can give you a mood boost and free up your time to improve your physical health and connect with people in person, according to a 2021 article by Mysoon Ayuob, M.D., a family medicine physician at the Mayo Clinic Health System.