I've switched networks, you should give Avoidafone a try

With the number of hours we spend attached to a device per week skyrocketing, accidental screen junkie Helen Coffey attempts a range of hacks to wean herself off her smartphone

- By Helen Coffey

Look, I need to make it clear that I never intended to become the kind of person so attached to their phone that I'd end up walking into a tree. Or a lamp post. Or a bollard. But it's pointless to deny the truth.

Admittedly, it was dark (and I was drunk) when the tree thing happened. It's little consolation. The fact remains that I strolled right into a whacking great trunk while glued to my screen; I've still got the scars to prove it. The bollard one was even more humiliating - I ended up hitting it vulva-first in broad daylight while pawing furiously at WhatsApp. As for the lamp post... well, the less said about that, the better.

Accidents aside, I've become increasingly anxious about the steady creep of phone addiction over the past 18 months. I often find myself scrolling without remembering when or why I started, suddenly “coming to” out of a fugue-like state with a fuzzy, cotton-wool head. A cosy night in watching a film is inevitably marred by my fractured attention span - I'll spend half of it transfixed by the smaller screen clutched in my hand instead.

I'm not alone. Average mobile phone use over the past decade has leapt from one hour and 17 minutes a day to three hours and 21 minutes, according to research from the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising; the daily average for looking at all types of screen (mobiles, laptops, tablets, games consoles and TV) is now almost 7.5 hours.

It wouldn't be such a big deal if we were happy about this state of affairs, but most of us categorically are not. Increased screen time has gone hand in hand with rising global depression rates over the past 20 years, while research has shown a correlation between problematic smartphone use and anxiety, depression, stress and decreased wellbeing.