Barry Tobin

For my final year project, I looked at smartphone addiction and in particular phubbing and nomophobia. Phubbing is a relatively new term to describe a person who is snubbing others in favour of their smartphone. Nomophobia is a fear of being without your smartphone or of being disconnected as a result of the absence of one’s smartphone.

There is a growing concern about the effects of social media on our communication skills. More and more people use their smartphones to avoid conversation and pretend to be busy while browsing through Facebook or 9GAG.

The project hopes to address this issue through a series of short films. Each of which will be look at a specific aspect and how smartphones are impeding on the potential of the scenario e.g. in one short film a couple are on a dinner date but their entire conversation will take place through WhatsApp, however when the smartphones are removed from the scenario, all is more cheerful and social.

The campaign will also include a series of posters encouraging young people to unplug from their smartphones and live for the present moment.