How do you know when you or your friends are candidates for disconnect anxiety? Here are some key indicator questions developed by SRG for its study.
Do you:
- 1. Strongly or somewhat agree with the statement "my cellphone goes everywhere I go?"
- 2. Use your wireless device "frequently" at home instead of your home phone?
- 3. Strongly or somewhat agree with this statement: "When I leave home without my cellphone, I feel cut off"
- 4. Spend four hours or more using the Internet -- work or personal -- per day on average?
- 5. Used IM (instant messenger) in the last week?
- 6. Have a Facebook profile that you visit at least once a day?
- 7. Strongly agree with the statement, "The world is not as safe as it used to be"?
- 8. Used a laptop in your living room or bedroom in the last week?
- 9. Text messaged on a regular cell or sent e-mail using a BlackBerry, Treo or similar in the evenings or the weekend in the last week?
Scoring
Score one point for each "yes" for questions 1-8 inclusive and 2 points if "yes" to the last question. The maximum score is 10. A score of 7 or more means you are a candidate to feel elevated levels of anxiety if disconnected even for a short period of time. A score of 5-6 means you will experience some anxiety when disconnected.
Bonus Questions
- Do you have a regular cellphone and a BlackBerry? (4 per cent of Canadians do)
- Did you take a laptop on your last vacation? (43 per cent of laptop owners did)
- Did you ever use a wireless device or a laptop in the bathroom? (51 per cent of BlackBerry owners did)
- Do you almost always have a PC/laptop with you when you are watching TV? (14 per cent do)
If you said yes to two of the above bonus questions and scored a seven or more in the previous quiz, you may not make it through the next power outage -- good luck
