Physical and Psycho-Social Impact of Mobile Phone Usage among the High School Students of Rural Areas in Bangladesh

Md Sayed Ali, Md Akhter Hossain

Abstract

Mobile phone is the most common means of communication with family, friends, and Business partners and even in office work at home and abroad. Bangladesh is a densely populated country of 160 million people where 130 million people (1.2) including 4 million teenagers (10-16 year age) use mobile phone.  A study entitled “Physical and psychosocial impact of mobile phone usage among the high school students of rural areas in Bangladesh” was conducted to assess the physical and psychosocial impact of mobile phone among school going teen agers.  The specific objectives were to: (1) describe the socio-demographic and economic characteristics of parents. (2) assess knowledge on different options of standard mobile phones (3) identify attitude towards proper utilization of mobile phones by the high school students and (4) to explore the common areas of practice of mobile phones. It was a descriptive cross sectional study. at Seven upozillas in six districts of five divisions in Bangladesh. These were conveniently selected for the study. Sample size was 384 respondents. Data were collected from respondents using a pretested semi structured questionnaire through face to face interviews. Data thus obtained were analyzed using SPSS (version21.0). One of the major findings was that 63% high school students used mobile phones. Regarding parental professions, 13 % parents were farmers, followed by 29% businessmen, 34% Government employees, while only 5.5 % were illiterate. Parents’ monthly income was 9000 BDT /112.5 USD to 15,000 BDT /187.5 USD (29 %) and maximum income was more than 50,000 BDT/ 625 USD 14.5 %. Mobile phone expense 20 BDT/ 0.25 USD (17 %) and more than 500 BDT/ 6.25 USD (1I%) The respondents have been using mobile phones for one year (63%) and for two years (18%). Respondents visit internet (33%), enjoy games (28%) and visit face book (21%). This study also revealed that they faced physical problems such as headache (45%), neck pain (17%), and heart palpitation (13%). Psychological problems like stress (10 %) and sleep disturbance (14 %). Social problems like incidence of derailment (0.5%) were reported by the respondents though 91 % parents monitor their children’s mobile phones. It is recommended that of mobile phone use should be controlled and monitored more carefully by their guardians to reduce physical, psychological and social problems as identified by this study. Health departments may consider utilizing ICT, especially mobile phones for information dissemination, health education and health promotion among the students.

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