CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 328Impact of Technology on AdolescentsCOVID-19 and Mental HealthGender and Technology in Education

Nomophobia: An Individual’s Growing Fear of Being without a Smartphone—A Systematic Literature Review

Open access
Rodríguez-García, Antonio-Manuel, Moreno-Guerrero, Antonio-José, López Belmonte, Jesús·2020·International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
DOI 10.3390/ijerph17020580PMC PMC7013598
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

This review examines the current literature focused on nomophobia (objectives, methodological design, main variables, sample details, and measurement methods) in the Scopus and Web of Science databases. To this end, we conducted a systematic literature review in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews (PRISMA) guidelines. The initial sample consisted of 142 articles, of which 42 met the inclusion criteria and were analyzed in detail. The findings show that the current research is in an exploratory phase, with a greater predominance of descriptive, nonexperimental, and cross-sectional studies that explore the prevalence of nomophobia mainly in adolescents and university students. The most widely used measurement instrument is the Nomophobia Questionnaire (NMP-Q) proposed by Yildrim and Correia. In addition, the research suggests that nomophobia negatively affects personality, self-esteem, anxiety, stress, academic performance, and other physical and mental health problems. We are therefore faced with a health problem, which negatively affects a person, causing psychological problems and physical and behavioral changes.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.3390/ijerph17020580

Cites

6 of 6 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Nomophobia is related to a preference for constant online social interaction (use oriented toward social gratification) and is usually associated with problematic use of social networks.

    “Nomophobia is also related to a preference for constant online social interaction (use oriented toward social gratification) and is usually associated with the problematic use of social networks (Arpaci, 2022;Galhardo et al., 2020;Rodríguez-García et al., 2020).”

    From Problematic use of social media in adolescents or excessive social gratification? The mediating role of nomophobia (2024) · cites this paper as Rodríguez-García et al., 2020

    The Introduction reports a direct link between nomophobia and social-network dependence, and describes fear of losing communication with others. It also says some young people prefer digital to physical contact, but does not establish a preference for constant online social interaction or social gratification specifically among people with nomophobia. No page number is available in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.83)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • The preference for online social interaction and the fear of losing this connection contribute significantly to problematic social media use.

    “Thus, the preference for online social interaction and the fear of losing this connection contribute significantly to problematic social media use (Arpaci, 2022;Galhardo et al., 2020;Rodríguez-García et al., 2020).”

    From Problematic use of social media in adolescents or excessive social gratification? The mediating role of nomophobia (2024) · cites this paper as Rodríguez-García et al., 2020

    The Introduction (page unavailable) says some young people prefer digital contact and describes fear of losing access to communication. It also reports a significant link between nomophobia and social-network dependence. It does not establish that preference and fear significantly contribute to problematic social media use; the reported link is an association, not that causal finding. (LLM, conf=0.86)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • A systematic review found adverse effects of NMP on academic performance.

    “These findings are consistent with the results of a systematic review about the adverse effects of NMP on academic performance [81]”

    From Personal Profiles, Family Environment, Patterns of Smartphone Use, Nomophobia, and Smartphone Addiction across Low, Average, and High Perceived Academic Performance Levels among High School Students in the Philippines (2021) · cites this paper as [81]

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 52

  1. [1]Bartwal J. Nath B. Evaluation of nomophobia among medical students using smartphone in north India Med. J. Armed Forces India 2019 10.1016/j.mjafi.2019.03.001 PMC7606098 33162655 · DOI
  2. [2]Prasad M. Patthi B. Singla A. Gupta R. Saha S. Kumar J.K. Malhi R. Pandita V. Nomophobia: A cross-sectional study to assess mobile phone usage among dental students J. Clin. Diagn. Res. 2017 11 34 39 10.7860/JCDR/2017/20858.9341 PMC5376814 28384977 · DOI
  3. [3]Park C.S. Kaye B.K. Smartphone and self-extension: Functionally, anthropomorphically, and ontologically extending self via the smartphone Mob. Media Commun. 2019 7 215 231 10.1177/2050157918808327 · DOI
  4. [4]Bragazzi N.L. Simona T. Zerbetto R. The relationship between nomophobia and maladaptive coping styles in a sample of Italian young adults: Insights and implications from a cross-sectional study JMIR Ment. Health 2019 6 e123154 10.2196/13154 30763254 PMC6505371 · DOI
  5. [5]King A.L.S. Valença A.M. Nardi A.E. Nomophobia: The mobile phone in panic disorder with agoraphobia: Reducing phobias or worsening of dependence? Cogn. Behav. Neurol. 2010 23 52 54 10.1097/WNN.0b013e3181b7eabc 20299865 · DOI
  6. [6]Kneidinger-Mueller B. When the smartphone goes offline: A factorial survey of smartphone users’ experiences of mobile unavailability Comput. Hum. Behav. 2019 98 1 10 10.1016/j.chb.2019.03.037 · DOI
  7. [7]Lin C.Y. Griffiths M.D. Pakpour A.H. Psychometric evaluation of Persian Nomophobia Questionnaire: Differential item functioning and measurement invariance across gender J. Behav. Addict. 2018 7 100 108 10.1556/2006.7.2018.11 29444607 PMC6035024 · DOI
  8. [9]Basu S. Garg S. Singh M. Kohli C. Addiction-like behavior associated with mobile phone usage among medical students in Delhi Indian J. Psychol. Med. 2018 40 446 451 10.4103/IJPSYM.IJPSYM_59_18 30275620 PMC6149311 · DOI
  9. [10]Aboujaoude E. Problematic Internet use two decades later: Apps to wean us off apps CNS Spectr. 2019 24 371 373 10.1017/S109285291800127X 30507371 · DOI
  10. [12]Adawi M. Zerbetto R. Re T.S. Bisharat B. Mahamid M. Amital H. Del Puente G. Bragazzi N.L. Psychometric properties of the brief symptom inventory in nomophobic subjects: Insights from preliminary confirmatory factor, exploratory factor, and clustering analyses in a sample of healthy italian volunteers Psychol. Res. Behav. Manag. 2019 12 145 154 10.2147/PRBM.S173282 30881158 PMC6419603 · DOI
  11. [13]Lee S. Kim M.W. McDonough I.M. Mendoza J.S. Kim M.S. The Effects of Cell Phone Use and Emotion-regulation Style on College Students’ Learning Appl. Cogn. Psychol. 2017 31 360 366 10.1002/acp.3323 · DOI
  12. [14]Adawi M. Bragazzi N.L. Argumosa-Villar L. Boada-Grau J. Vigil-Colet A. Yildirim C. Del Puente F. Watad A. Translation and validation of the nomophobia questionnaire in the Italian language: Exploratory factor analysis JMIR Mhealth Uhealth 2018 6 1 9 10.2196/mhealth.9186 29358161 PMC5799721 · DOI
  13. [15]Mertkan D. Burcin N. Sezen-Gultekin G. Gemikonakli O. Relationship between nomophobia and fear of missing out among Turkish university students Cypriot J. Educ. Sci. 2018 13 549 561 10.18844/cjes.v13i4.3464 · DOI
  14. [16]Olivencia-Carrión M.A. Ferri-García R. Rueda M.D.M. Jiménez-Torres M.G. López-Torrecillas F. Temperament and characteristics related to nomophobia Psychiatry Res. 2018 266 5 10 10.1016/j.psychres.2018.04.056 29787807 · DOI
  15. [18]Ahmed S. Pokhrel N. Roy S. Samuel A.J. Impact of nomophobia: A nondrug addiction among students of physiotherapy course using an online cross-sectional survey Indian J. Psychiatry 2019 61 77 80 30745658 PMC6341932
  16. [19]Farooqui I.A. Pore P. Gothankar J. Nomophobia: An emerging issue in medical institutions? J. Ment. Health 2018 27 438 441 10.1080/09638237.2017.1417564 29271270 · DOI
  17. [20]King A.L.S. Valença A.M. Silva A.C.O. Baczynski T. Carvalho M.R. Nardi A.E. Nomophobia: Dependency on virtual environments or social phobia? Comput. Hum. Behav. 2013 29 140 144 10.1016/j.chb.2012.07.025 · DOI · Paper page
  18. [22]Al-Balhan E.M. Khabbache H. Watfa A. Re T.S. Zerbetto R. Bragazzi N.L. Psychometric evaluation of the Arabic version of the nomophobia questionnaire: Confirmatory and exploratory factor analysis—Implications from a pilot study in Kuwait among university students Psychol. Res. Behav. Manag. 2018 11 471 482 10.2147/PRBM.S169918 30425594 PMC6202036 · DOI
  19. [23]Ali A. Muda M. Ridzuan A.R. Nuji M.N.N. Izzamuddin M.H.M. Latiff D.I.A. The relationship between phone usage factors and nomophobia Adv. Sci. Lett. 2017 23 7610 7613 10.1166/asl.2017.9534 · DOI
  20. [25]Lee S. Kim M. Mendoza J.S. McDonough I.M. Addicted to cellphones: Exploring the psychometric properties between the nomophobia questionnaire and obsessiveness in college students Heliyon 2018 4 1 20 10.1016/j.heliyon.2018.e00895 PMC6223106 30426100 · DOI
  21. [26]Ozdemir B. Cakir O. Hussain I. Prevalence of Nomophobia among university students: A comparative study of Pakistani and Turkish undergraduate students Eurasia J. Math. Sci. Technol. Ed. 2018 14 1519 1532 10.29333/ejmste/84839 · DOI
  22. [27]Gutiérrez-Puertas L. Márquez-Hernández V.V. Aguilera-Manrique G. Adaptation and validation of the Spanish version of the nomophobia questionnaire in nursing studies CIN Comput. Inform. Nurs. 2016 34 470 475 10.1097/CIN.0000000000000268 27315303 · DOI
  23. [29]Dasgupta P. Bhattacherjee S. Dasgupta S. Roy J.K. Mukherjee A. Biswas R. Nomophobic behaviors among smartphone using medical and engineering students in two colleges of West Bengal Indian J. Public Health 2017 61 199 204 10.4103/ijph.IJPH_81_16 28928304 · DOI
  24. [30]Gutiérrez-Puertas L. Márquez-Hernández V.V. São-Romão-Preto L. Granados-Gámez G. Gutiérrez-Puertas V. Aguilera-Manrique G. Comparative study of nomophobia among Spanish and Portuguese nursing students Nurse Educ. Pract. 2019 34 79 84 10.1016/j.nepr.2018.11.010 30472531 · DOI
  25. [31]Aguilera-Manrique G. Márquez-Hernández V.V. Alcaraz-Córdoba T. Granados-Gámez G. Gutiérrez-Puertas V. Gutiérrez-Puertas L. The relationship between nomophobia and the distraction associated with smartphone use among nursing students in their clinical practicum PLoS ONE 2018 13 e0202953 10.1371/journal.pone.0202953 30148870 PMC6110512 · DOI
  26. [32]Yildirim C. Sumuer E. Adnan M. Yildirim S. A growing fear: Prevalence of nomophobia among Turkish college students Inf. Dev. 2016 32 1322 1331 10.1177/0266666915599025 · DOI
  27. [33]Darvishi M. Noori M. Nazer M.R. Sheikholeslami S. Karimi E. Investigating different dimensions of nomophobia among medical students: A cross-sectional study Open Access Maced. J. Med. Sci. 2019 7 573 578 10.3889/oamjms.2019.138 30894914 PMC6420939 · DOI
  28. [34]González-Cabrera J. León-Mejía A. Pérez-Sancho C. Calvete E. Adaptation of the Nomophobia Questionnaire (NMP-Q) to Spanish in a sample of adolescents Actas Españolas Psiquiatr. 2017 45 137 144 28745386
  29. [35]Argumosa-Villar L. Boada-Grau J. Vigil-Colet A. Exploratory investigation of theoretical predictors of nomophobia using the Mobile Phone Involvement Questionnaire (MPIQ) J. Adolesc. 2017 56 127 135 10.1016/j.adolescence.2017.02.003 28231484 · DOI
  30. [36]Gentina E. Li-Ping T. Dancoine P.F. Does Gen Z’s emotional intelligence promote iCheating (cheating with iPhone) yet curb iCheating through reduced nomophobia? Comput. Educ. 2018 126 231 247 10.1016/j.compedu.2018.07.011 · DOI
  31. [37]Ayar D. Özalp G. Özdemir E.Z. Bektaş M. The Effect of Problematic Internet Use, Social Appearance Anxiety, and Social Media Use on Nursing Students’ Nomophobia Levels CIN Comput. Inform. Nurs. 2018 36 589 595 10.1097/CIN.0000000000000458 30004948 · DOI
  32. [38]Betoncu O. Ozdamli F. The disease of 21st century: Digital disease TEM J. 2019 8 598 603 10.18421/TEM82-37 · DOI
  33. [39]Arpaci I. Baloğlu M. Özteke H.I. Kesici S. Individual differences in the relationship between attachment and nomophobia among college students: The mediating role of mindfulness J. Med. Internet. Res. 2017 19 e404 10.2196/jmir.8847 29242179 PMC5746620 · DOI
  34. [41]Rojas-Jara C. Ramos-Vera J. Pardo-González E. Henríquez-Caroca F. Adicción a internet en adolescentes: Una breve revisión Drugs Addict. Behav. 2018 3 267 281 10.21501/24631779.2876 · DOI
  35. [42]Ruiz-Palmero J. Sánchez-Rodríguez J. Trujillo-Torres J.M. Utilización de Internet y dependencia a teléfonos móviles en adolescentes Rev. Latinoam. Cienc. Soc. Niñez Y Juv. 2016 14 1357 1369 10.11600/1692715x.14232080715 · DOI
  36. [43]De la Villa Moral M. Suárez C. Factores de riesgo en el uso problemático de Internet y del teléfono móvil en adolescentes españoles Rev. Iberoam. Psicol. Salud 2016 7 69 78 10.1016/j.rips.2016.03.001 · DOI
  37. [44]Buiza-Aguado C. García-Calero A. Alonso-Cánovas A. Ortiz-Soto P. Guerrero-Díaz M. González-Molinier M. Hernández-Medrano I. Los videojuegos: Una afición con implicaciones neuropsiquiátricas Psicol. Educ. 2017 23 129 136 10.1016/j.pse.2017.05.001 · DOI
  38. [45]Guedes E. Sancassiani F. Carta M.G. Campos C. Machado S. Spear A.L. Nardi A.E. Internet addiction and excessive social networks use: What about Facebook? Clin. Pract. Epidemiol. Ment. Health 2016 12 43 48 10.2174/1745017901612010043 27418940 PMC4926056 · DOI
  39. [47]Arpaci I. Culture and nomophobia: The role of vertical versus horizontal collectivism in predicting nomophobia Inf. Dev. 2019 35 96 106 10.1177/0266666917730119 · DOI
  40. [49]Aksnes D.W. Sivertsen G. A Criteria-based Assessment of the Coverage of Scopus and Web of Science J. Data Inf. Sci. 2019 4 1 21 10.2478/jdis-2019-0001 · DOI
  41. [50]Anshari M. Alas Y. Hardaker G. Jaidin J.H. Smith M. Ahad A.D. Smartphone habit and behavior in Brunei: Personalization, gender, and generation gap Comput. Hum. Behav. 2016 64 719 727 10.1016/j.chb.2016.07.063 · DOI · Paper page
  42. [52]Csibi S. Griffiths M.D. Cook B. Demetrovics Z. Szabo A. The Psychometric Properties of the Smartphone Application-Based Addiction Scale (SABAS) Int. J. Ment. Health Addict. 2018 16 393 403 10.1007/s11469-017-9787-2 29670500 PMC5897481 · DOI
  43. [53]Liu T. Sun Y. Li Z. Xin T. The Impact of Aberrant Response on Reliability and Validity Measurement 2019 17 133 142 10.1080/15366367.2019.1584848 · DOI
  44. [55]Siddiqi N. Jahan F. Moin F. Shehhi F.A.L. Balushi F.A.L. Excessive use of mobile phones by medical students: Should precautions be taken? Biomed. Pharmacol. J. 2017 10 1631 1638 10.13005/bpj/1274 · DOI
  45. [56]Tangmunkongvorakul A. Musumari P.M. Thongpibul K. Srithanaviboonchai K. Techasrivichien T. Suguimoto S.P. Non-Kihara M. Kihara M. Association of excessive smartphone use with psychological well-being among university students in Chiang Mai, Thailand PLoS ONE 2019 14 e0210294 10.1371/journal.pone.0210294 30615675 PMC6322718 · DOI
  46. [58]Arpaci I. Baloğlu M. Kesici Ş. A multi-group analysis of the effects of individual differences in mindfulness on nomophobia Inf. Dev. 2019 35 333 341 10.1177/0266666917745350 · DOI
  47. [59]King A.L.S. Martins A. Valença A.M. Cardoso A. Sancassiani F. Machado S. Egidio A. «Nomophobia»: Impact of cell phone use interfering with symptoms and emotions of individuals with panic disorder compared with a control group Clin. Pract. Epidemiol. Ment. Health 2014 10 28 35 10.2174/1745017901410010028 24669231 PMC3962983 · DOI
  48. [60]Musa R. Saidon J. Rahman S.A. Who’s at risk for smartphone nomophobia and pathology; the young or matured urban millennials? Adv. Sci. Lett. 2017 23 7486 7489 10.1166/asl.2017.9504 · DOI
  49. [61]Lee Y.S. Yang H.S. Jeong C.J. Yoo Y.D. Jeong G.Y. Moon J.S. Hong S.W. Changes in the thickness of median nerves due to excessive use of smartphones J. Phys. Ther. Sci. 2012 24 1259 1262 10.1589/jpts.24.1259 · DOI
  50. [63]Han S. Kim K.J. Kim J.H. Understanding Nomophobia: Structural Equation Modeling and Semantic Network Analysis of Smartphone Separation Anxiety Cyberpsychol. Behav. Soc. Netw. 2017 20 419 427 10.1089/cyber.2017.0113 28650222 · DOI
  51. [64]Rosales-Huamani J.A. Guzman-Lopez R.R. Aroni-Vilca E.E. Matos-Avalos C.R. Castillo-Sequera J.L. Determining symptomatic factors of nomophobia in peruvian students from the national university of engineering Appl. Sci. 2019 9 1814 10.3390/app9091814 · DOI
  52. [65]Bragazzi N.L. Del Puente G. A proposal for including nomophobia in the new DSM-V Psychol. Res. Behav. Manag. 2014 7 155 160 10.2147/PRBM.S41386 24876797 PMC4036142 · DOI · Paper page

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Rodríguez-García, A.-M., Moreno-Guerrero, A.-J., & López Belmonte, J.
Affiliations
  • Universidad de Granada (ES)
  • Department of Didactics and School Organization, University of Granada, 18071 Granada, Spain
ORCID
Venue
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Publisher
MDPI AG
Published
2020-01-16
Volume
17
Issue
2
Pages
580
ISSN
1660-4601 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.3390/ijerph17020580
PMC
PMC7013598
OpenAlex
W2998861261
Cited by
328
References
6
Citations by year
2026: 40 · 2025: 53 · 2024: 65 · 2023: 66 · 2022: 42 · 2021: 42 · 2020: 20
FWCI
7.47
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
  • Institutional Repository of the University of Granada (University of Granada) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • LA Referencia (Red Federada de Repositorios Institucionales de Publicaciones Científicas) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • Universidad de Granada
  • Junta de Andalucía
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Impact of Technology on Adolescents
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › COVID-19 and Mental Health
  • Social Sciences › Gender Studies › Gender and Technology in Education
Keywords
nomophobia, smartphone addiction, fear of missing out, Nomophobia Questionnaire, adolescents, university students, self-esteem, anxiety, stress, academic performance, mental health, physical health, behavior change, personality
MeSH terms
Smartphone, Anxiety, Cross-Sectional Studies, Humans, Phobic Disorders

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review