Smartphone use has quickly become a fixture of everyday life, including during church services. Drawing from the Theory of Reasoned Action and the Technology Acceptance Model, we develop a model to identify key drivers of smartphone use during church services. Smartphone Playfulness was included in the model to reflect a more intrinsic motivation to use one’s smartphone during church services. Study 1 surveys 329 US adults and finds that our newly developed model explains 66 percent of the variation in intentions to use one’s smartphone during church services. A second study conducted six weeks later with 164 of the original respondents finds that behavioral intentions explains 44 percent of the variation in actual smartphone use. Findings suggest that the newly developed model presented herein is a valuable tool in explaining smartphone use in church and may prove helpful in explaining acceptance decisions across a wide variety of computer-based media technologies.

Partner phubbing (phone snubbing) is the perceived extent to which an individual uses or is distracted by his or her cellphone while in the company of his/her relationship partner. The present research examines the impact of partner phubbing on relationship satisfaction through an Expectancy Violations Theory perspective. Across two studies, including a survey of 180 adults currently in a romantic relationship, and an experiment of 141 married adults, results reveal that partner phubbing results in negative expectancy violations, which in turn lower relationship satisfaction. However, support is found for moderated mediation, such that the negative indirect effect of partner phubbing on relationship satisfaction depends on the phubber’s level of partner reward value. When partner reward value is low, expectancy violations from partner phubbing have a strong negative effect on relationship satisfaction, but this effect is attenuated to non-significance when partner reward value is high.

The smartphone has become an integral part of modern life. Many people cannot imagine a life without their smartphone. The sole focus of this research is to create and validate a measure of smartphone orientation to reflect individuals’ interactions with their smartphones as a part of their everyday lifestyle. Presently, the literature offers a variety of smartphone addiction scales of which many suffer from inadequate assessment of the scale’s reliability, validity, theoretical underpinnings, and most scales have too many items. Additionally, research suggests that several of these scales are only weakly associated with actual smartphone use. Across three studies and 867 respondents, a rigorous process was undertaken to create and validate the Smartphone Orientation Scale (SOS). Study 1 involved defining smartphone orientation, creating the scale items, and using a survey of 288 US adults to assess the scale’s psychometric properties and nomological validity; scale analysis resulted in an 8-item SOS scale which exhibits both convergent and discriminant validity. Study 2 surveyed 163 undergraduates to further assess the validity of the SOS; results provide evidence of discriminant, convergent, and nomological validity. Study 3 utilized a survey of 416 undergraduates and found that the SOS was positively associated with social media usage, social media intensity, and actual smartphone use. Overall, the above research offers a valid, 8-item scale that can be used to measure the intensity of an individual’s smartphone orientation. Recent research shows that how we relate to our technology impacts our well-being. Future research directions and study limitations are also discussed.

The human need to belong is an innate drive that dictates much of our behavior. Informed by The Belongingness Hypothesis and Information Foraging Theory, the present study examines the relationship between FoMO and well-being. Study 1 (107 college students) investigates the relationship between FoMO, social media intensity and social connection. Results find that FoMO is positively associated with social media intensity, but negatively associated with social connection. The mediation tests, interestingly, reveal more positive results regarding FoMO. Specifically, FoMO has a positive indirect effect on social connection through social media intensity, suggesting that FoMO may, in some cases, be a good thing leading to enhanced social connection. Study 2 (458 college students) finds that FoMO impacts subjective well-being both directly (negatively) and indirectly (positively) through its impact on social media intensity and social connection. Results of the two studies reveal a nuanced model of FoMO and its relationships with social media intensity, connection, and well-being. FoMO can have a positive impact on well-being if it leads to social media use that fosters social connection. Study limitations and future research directions are discussed.

Research suggests that people around the world spend anywhere from an hour to as much as ten hours daily on their smartphones. However, the vast majority of this research has used self-reported data, which is widely considered unreliable. The present research is among the first to capture actual smartphone use and to examine its relationship with individual and relational well-being. Results reveal that, although smartphone use is generally negatively associated with well-being, this is not always so. Deeper analyses show that certain categories of apps are positively associated with well-being, thus revealing a more nuanced relationship between smartphone use and individual well-being. Research which suggests a negative association between smartphone use and well-being may represent an oversimplified perspective of a complex relationship.