GUDANG BACA

 Written by : Rina Khafizah

In these days, smartphone is one of the most important tools that probably everyone should have. Why? Because in these globalization eras, everything will be connected easier through electronic items, such as gadget or we might call it smartphone. People these days normally using their smartphone to get to know any updates from everything. We can say that smartphone is really helping us for connecting with people that stay aboard. Not just people that we just know, smartphone also help us to stay connect with our family that we can't see every day or in some period of time. Even though smartphone helps us in many aspects, still use it too much will be a bad thing, especially for children.

In the past few months, the percentage of children using smartphone is increased because many schools going to online. Even though not all children doing it, but most of them will get distracted when they should be studying. Most of them will take more time playing with their smartphone even though they have a lot of homework. According to researchers, the use of smartphone for children will make them addicted and it will certainly affect their academic grades in school. “Students actually know and realize that the use of technology has a negative impact on people around them when used for off-task purposes like browsing the web,” Elena Neiterman, a Waterloo teaching fellow and one of the authors of the study, said. “They still feel like is still necessary when the classes are not engaging enough.”  They will be studying for a couple of minutes then when their smartphone rings, they will immediately pick it up and end up being busy with it. They will forget about their homework as soon as they have their smartphone on their hands. Based on that, their academic grades will be affected. If they spend too much time for smartphone and don't studying at all, they will be easily distracted and when they have to face the exams, they will not be ready at all. Then, they will get a low score.

Not just risk their academic grades, using smartphone too much will affect their social life as well. Let's just say, they will be just focus on their smartphone and everything will be ignored by them. Their friendship will have a big distance because they too focus on their smartphone. “Smartphones and their affordances create new contexts for disclosing information about who we are and for being responsive to others, and these virtual connections may have downstream unwanted effects on our current relationships. When you are distracted into or by the device, then your attention is divided, and being responsive to our partners – an essential ingredient for building intimacy – requires attention in the here and now.” said one of the Professor from University of Arizona psychology, Professor David Sbarra.  In some cases, based on my experience, many children will ignore their parents too. For example, when their parents ask them for help and they just focus on their smartphone, they will absolutely don't want to do it.

Using smartphone too much will also affect their health. Like playing games with their smartphone or just searching the internet in a long time without rest will be bad for their health. In 2011, International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified mobile phone radiation possibly carcinogenic, means that there “could be some risk” of carcinogenicity, so additional research into the long-term, heavy use of mobile phones needs to be conducted. The American Cancer Society (ACS) states that the IARC classification means that there could be some risk associated with cancer, but the evidence is not strong enough to be considered causal and needs to be investigated further. Individuals who are concerned about radiofrequency exposure can limit their exposure, including using an ear piece and limiting cell phone use, particularly among children. Because they're addicted to the smartphone, sometimes they would probably skip their lunch or even their dinner. It can be happened if they found something interesting on the internet and they'll feel it would be bad idea if they leave it even just for meals. Then, because of that, they will get sick easily. Not just their body, but their eyes too. Watching smartphone for a period of time and didn't rest at all will definitely make their eyes tired. Their eyes will be getting red and little bit wet, that's a sign so that they will know that they need rest. If they still doing it without rest or give their body some nutrients, they will get sick and their eyes will be hurt.

Although smartphones have a lot of bad impacts for children, adults (especially parents) should be able to take care of them. Make a schedule for the children so that they can separate time when can they playing their phones and when they should be studying. Give the time limit for them when they want to play their gadget and remind them don’t skip their mealtime and sleep time so that they can be productive. Smartphones in these days just like an important tool that everyone should have because it’ll help everyone to do their jobs. Even children, smartphone will help them on doing their homework so that they can get an information everywhere, anytime and unlimited access. In the year of 2008, smartphone industries welcomed a new operating system called Android, introduced by Google. The concepts of smartphone applications came around at the same time when the first smartphones were released. Since then, many applications to run on an Android operating system have been developed by programmers around the world. The popularity of smartphone is very encouraging.

        Based on those explanations, using smartphone for children should be controlled by adults, especially their parents. Using smartphone without any adult watching them will end up being addicted. They will focus on the smartphone and forgot their school, homework, friends even their health. Smartphone is a very useful tool but sometimes using it over and out of control will be a bad idea. Especially for children, they should be watched by adults when they got a chance to hold a smartphone on their hands. In these eras, if children using smartphone without any adults controlled them, they will be lost on some sites that might be dangerous for themselves. Not just that, using smartphone too often and don't study will affect their academic scores and their social life as well. So that, using smartphone should be controlled for children to handle that kind of issue.