Young people are afraid of calling. It sounds surprising that theGeneration Smartphone
Should be afraid of their constant companion. However, this always suggests surveys and scientific studies.
Young people are afraid of calls
A survey from last year among 2000 young British between 18 and 34 showed that many of them have an aversion to telephone calls. They state the following reasons:
- 23 percent state that they do not accept at all when calls for phone calls.
- 56 percent stated that they would expect bad news when calling friends and relatives.
- 24 percent are simply too busy to accept calls.
- 23 percent do not want to be interrupted.
The younger generation prefers to make different forms of communication:
- 48 percent of younger respondents prefer social media.
Compared to only 11 percent of the over 55-year-old social media appreciates more than the phone. - 37 percent prefer voice messages than phone calls.
In contrast, this claims only 1 percent of the 35-54 -year -olds.
Even if this is only a survey, theJim-Studie 2018About the media use of children and adolescents that almost every fifth between 12 and 19 years avoids calling calls.
You can do that if you are afraid of the phone
Telephobia, telephone phobia or fear of telephone are not a clinical diagnosis. The psychiatrist Dr. Nadine Wolf explainedNational Geographicopposite that the fear of telephone can occur in the context of social phobias. With a social phobia you fear thattesting consideration or evaluation by others
. The psychologist Sophie Bischoff explains imSpiegelThat it is advisable to first think about what you are actually afraid of.
What fear is behind it? That you could stutter, get messed up and then think badly of you?
It is human to avoid situations that cause fear. And - as in the survey shown above - this is quite easy to make when calling. You just don't go.
So if you have the feeling that you suffer from afraid of telephone, you should first check whether it is only about calling. Wolf explains:
If it is only isolated that someone is afraid of making a phone call and avoiding this situation, the strategy would be to say: I no longer avoid the situation, but challenge it and practice calling.
If this does not help and there is an assumption that there is a general fear of social interaction, you should obtain medical advice.
Bischoff explains that social phobia is a common anxiety disease and there are studies that indicate that young people are affected more often.
The communication channels have become more diverse
Most who prefer to avoid calls should not suffer from an anxiety disease. The aversion to a means of communication is most likely related to technical development. And above all, it brought people a variety of communication channels:
- The phone has been around since 1876.
- It has belonged to around the 1970sBasic equipment of a household.
- SMS and emails were added in the 1990s.
- Messenger services such as WhatsApp have been around since the early 2010s.
The diversification of the remote communication means makes the phone less familiar to younger people, simply because they grew up with various options.
In general, writing about Messenger and also sending voice messages has the great advantage that you can communicate independently of the interlocutor in terms of time. This can at least give the impression that communication over social media saves time.
And even if older generations may be inclined to smile at the fear of telephone, the survey indicates that you too have developed certain preferences and dislikes with the technical development.
In the 1990s, telephones came up with display. Before that, you did not know that when the phone rings, you didn't know who called. The girlfriend could be the same as the tax office.
And this is exactly where the British survey makes no distinction between the generations: 50 percent of those surveyed prefer to know who calls beforehand.
How are you? Can you understand a fear or at least certain aversion to the phone? And if so, what are your strategies? Write it to us in the comments!
