Smartphones have many purposes inside and outside the office, that help us stay in touch with colleagues and complete urgent tasks when you are on the move. In spite of the convenience of smartphones, they can cause people to be less productive at work.
This according to a new psychological experiment by the Universities of Wurzburg in Germany and Nottingham Trent in the UK. The experiment revealed a connection between productivity and the distance between people who participated in the experiment and the smartphones. When their smartphones were taken away, their productivity improved by 26 per cent.
Kaspersky Lab Africa’s managing director, Riaan Baderhorst said that instead of expecting permanent access to their smartphones, employee productivity might be boosted if they have dedicated ‘smartphone-free time’ . One way of doing this is to enforce meeting rules such as no phones and cameras in the normal working environment
The behaviour of 95 people between the ages of 19 and 56 years old was tested during the experiment. The exercise took place in the universities’ laboratories and insured to balance experimental conditions and gender across laboratory sites. Researchers asked participants to do a concentration test under four different circumstances, with the smartphone in their pocket, at their desk, locked in a drawer and removed from the room completely.
The absence of the smartphones didn’t make participants nervous, contrary to popular belief. Across all experiments, anxiety levels were consistent, however, it was revealed that women were more anxious than males. This discovery led researchers to conclude that anxiety levels at work are not affected by smartphones but can be influenced by a person’s gender.
