Smartphone addiction poses grave risk to users’ safety

By Kim Jong-chan

It is easy to spot people in subway trains or in the street, especially young ones, absorbed in their mobile devices. Reports said the number of Korean smartphone users has reached 30 million.

People are glued to their smartphone, while waiting for traffic lights to change and waiting for a train or bus.

The problem, experts agree, is they are too absorbed in their mobile devices, while walking in the street.

They listen to music, send text messages, do chatting with someone, search for news articles, watch video footage or play games. They do these, while walking with their head down.

It distracts people’s attention, thus posing a grave risk to their safety, but few people appear cautious about this, experts say.

According to the Hankook Ilbo, a sister paper of The Korea Times, Sunday, 47 pedestrians were spotted glued to their mobile device from 5:40 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Friday in front of the Lotte Department Store in central Seoul.

At a commercial zone in Sinchon the same day, 48 or 10.6 percent of 451 pedestrians were found absorbed in smartphones for at least 30 minutes, the newspaper said.

Kim Woo-hyeon, 33, a company employee, recalled that he hit a bar, installed to prevent the entry of vehicles, in the street, while reading an article on his mobile device. He sustained minor injuries, but if he had been hit by a moving vehicle, they would have been more serious.

In Korea, smartphone addiction is considered a serious problem. The Ministry of Public Administration and Security said that 8.4 percent of smartphone users are presumed to be addicts, whereas 10.1 percent overuse social networking services such as Facebook and You Tube.