Two people can spend five hours on their smartphones and have surprisingly different habits.
Researchers at Semmelweis University in Hungary found that people who spent hours consuming online content showed differences in attention, memory, sleep, and self-control compared with those who primarily used their phones to communicate.
Roughly one-third of the university students studied fell into the heavy content-consumption group.
The findings suggest that what people do on their phones may reveal more about problematic smartphone habits than screen time alone.
Not All Smartphone Time Looks the Same
Researchers identified three types of smartphone users, and the differences went beyond how many hours they spent online.
The first group, called pure social users, mainly used their phones to communicate and maintain relationships.
The second group, light process users, mixed conversations with activities such as reading news, browsing, and watching entertainment, generally spending fewer than four to five hours daily on their devices.
The third group stood apart.
Heavy process users spent four or more hours each day on their smartphones, primarily consuming content rather than communicating with others.
That distinction complicates the familiar screen time warning. An hour spent messaging friends and an hour spent scrolling through videos may look identical on a usage report, but they represent different activities.
The researchers did not establish that one activity is automatically harmful or that crossing a particular number of hours makes smartphone use problematic.
The Connection to Fear of Missing Out
Fear of missing out emerged as the strongest positive psychological association with problematic smartphone use among the three factors researchers examined.
Dr. Johanna Takács, the study’s lead researcher, explained why personality alone does not tell the whole story.
“What really matters is how well they can control their behavior, emotions, and impulses, and how strongly they fear missing out,” Takács said in a statement published by Semmelweis University.
Researchers examined fear of missing out (FOMO), self-control, and neuroticism, a personality trait associated with a greater tendency to experience negative emotions.
Their analysis found that higher FOMO and neuroticism were associated with more problematic smartphone use. Greater self-control, meanwhile, was associated with fewer problematic behaviors.
FOMO showed the strongest positive association of the three, with a standardized coefficient of 0.353.
The findings do not establish that fear of missing out causes excessive scrolling. However, they identify emotional and behavioral factors worth considering when examining why some people struggle to regulate their phone use.
Related: More Americans Are Trying to Cut Screen Time, but the U.S. Is Not Exactly Going Offline
What Researchers Found About Memory and Sleep
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Heavy content users performed worse on certain attention and memory tests and reported poorer sleep, although the available summaries do not make it clear how large those differences were.
Participants in this group also reported a stronger desire for continuous stimulation and greater difficulty controlling impulses.
The findings raise questions about how prolonged content consumption relates to everyday cognitive performance. But the study cannot establish whether phone habits drove those differences or whether existing characteristics shaped how participants used their devices.
There are important limitations.
The research involved Hungarian university students aged 18 to 35, so its findings cannot automatically be extended to Americans of all ages. Publicly available summaries also lack enough detail on the exact sample size, response rate, or differences in cognitive test scores to assess their practical significance independently.
The university additionally discussed concerns about prolonged forward head posture while using smartphones. Researcher Beáta Seregély explained that neck receptors help the brain recognize head position, although the study did not establish that scrolling causes lasting balance problems.
What This Means for Everyday Phone Habits
The researchers suggested practical ways to manage smartphone use, but their study did not prove that changing these habits would improve memory or attention.
Semmelweis University recommended reducing unnecessary notifications, limiting social media browsing, and avoiding smartphone use before bedtime.
The researchers also discussed better posture, physical activity, and behavioral support for managing impulses.
These suggestions reflect patterns the study examined, rather than the results of an experiment showing that specific changes reverse cognitive or sleep difficulties.
That distinction matters because the research offers insight into smartphone behavior without delivering a definitive verdict on scrolling.
For years, screen time has provided a convenient number for judging how much attention people give their devices. Yet the Semmelweis findings suggest the number may miss a meaningful part of the picture.
A smartphone can connect someone to friends, deliver the latest news, or provide endless entertainment. The screen remains the same, even as the activity changes.
Perhaps that is the question to ask the next time your daily screen time report appears: Were you using your phone to connect with something meaningful, or simply scrolling because there was always something else to see?
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