Mobile Phones – What Indian Teenagers Can’t Live Without!

Every person in this world has his or her most valuable asset in life, so called the thing that he or she cannot live without. Indian teenagers today seem to have a big obsession for Mobile phones that these have become their most valuable assets in life. Literally, they cannot imagine a life without mobile phones. The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM) conducted a “Toy to Tool” survey, under its ASSOCHAM Social Development Foundation (ASDF) on adolescents of 15-18 years of age and found that 88% of them possess mobile phones as against 40% of teenagers aged 13-15 years who actually use them. Also 66 % of them between 16- 18 years of age have a tendency to flaunt a mobile phone while at school tuition or public places. This trendy yet bizarre tendency is due to factors such as more pampering by parents, more pocket money, no day-to-day parental control, urbanization and western influence. Conducted across Mumbai, Goa, Chennai, Hyderabad, Indore, Patna, Pune, Ahmedabad, Delhi, Chandigarh and Dehradun, the survey interviewed as many as 2000 parents and 2500 students and it was inferred that apart from talking, most of the children use mobile phones for sending SMS and MMS and online chatting. More often than not, these teenagers are often found using mobile phones while eating, attending school and even taking a bath. If the trend continues then there could be a habitual addiction. The survey further points out that 71% of the teenagers desire to have mobile phones that have MP3 players while 70 % of them want mobile phones with camera instead. Ironically, more than 90 % of the parents interviewed opined that they bought mobile phones for their children so that they do not disturb them, though they were concerned that their kids should not keep bad company. This is quite contrary to those 50 % parents who wanted to have their kids carrying mobile phones as they could be of great help for communication purposes during any emergency and also those 56% who believed that they should not be allowed to carry mobile phones to their schools. According to D.S. Rawat, Secretary General, ASSOCHAM, “Despite school structures and policies, the ground reality is that more than two-third of teens confessed that they use cell phones inside the school premises when they should not.” The mobile penetration is also very fast in our country. A report by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) said that mobile operators in India added about 17.10 million subscribers in September this year thereby making the total number of mobile users in the country to about 680 million. Today the trend is that these operators are launching mobile phones airtime recharge vouchers for as low as Rs. 10 to attract teenagers. The Flip Side While there may be some plus points on this huge popularity of mobile phones among teenagers, especially school goers, however, there is still a lurking danger that these teenagers may adopt bad habits such as smoking and drinking due to peer pressures. Also, chances are that they may be prone to abnormalities like disrupted sleep, restlessness, stress, fatigue and deviation from school home works. All said and done, it’s up to the parents to ensure that their children are using them in the right way. What do you say? Looking For A Social Media Agency?? TRY US! Related Posts Happy Mobile Number Portability Day? – MNP Kicks Off In Haryana To 3G Or Not 3G? Indian Search Results Indicate Wireless Internet Breakthrough Soon – Report After BlackBerry, BuzzCity Launches In-App Advertising For Android Curb On Bulk SMS, National Broadband Plan, MNP Coming Soon – TRAI

[via WATBlog.com - Web, Advertising and Technology Blog in India]