Millennials Are Turning Into Hunchbacks Because of All the Time Spent Staring at Their Phones
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry at this, honestly. Smartphones and tablets are creating a generation of hunchback millennials! All that time spent hunched over our phones and iPads is wreaking havoc on our necks and spines. For the love of god people, look up!
Hunchback Millennials is my new band name.
Image: Giphy
We’ve all heard the warnings about prolonged phone and tablet use. It’s bad for your brain, your eyes, your social development, blah blah blah. But maybe this particular warning will straighten some people up (literally!). Experts warn that millennials are suffering from something called “tech neck” because of slumping over their tech devices. Admit it, if you’re reading this on your phone, you just straightened up a bit, didn’t you?
Doctors say they’re seeing more and more patients in their 20’s with back problems that rival those of people twice or three times their age.
When you spend too much time hunched over something (your phone, for example), your posture gets worse. As a result, the muscles in your upper back stretch out and your neck creeps forward, making your head weigh 10 pounds more than it should. It’s not your big brain, millennials! Turns out, it’s your weak-ass necks.
It’s a pretty serious problem, or at least, it can develop into one. The bad posture can cause structural back problems and even breathing problems.
Dr. Brian Wallace, a chiropractor based in Bernardsville, New Jersey says this impedes their ability to breathe properly, which can increase their anxiety and even make them more susceptible to conditions like asthma. And a lot of young people are in denial about how their phone habits are impacting their spinal health. Says Dr. Vito Minervini, a chiropractor based in New Jersey, “They’ll say, ”˜I don’t know where this pain is coming from,’ and it’s a completely ridiculous statement. You [see] them hunched over their phones in the waiting room.”
You’d think that this would be a wake-up call for a lot of people, and they’ll make changes to their physical activity and maybe stop staring at their phones so much? But in reality, what this means is that someone (probably a millenial) will just invent some sort of device that holds your phone for you so you don’t develop a hump.
(Image: iStock / KEN226)