Smartphones are not making our children smarter

COLLECTING my son during the week I was parked outside a local sports club.

As each teenager exited the building they walked with earphones in and their heads tilted downwards, looking at their phones. They were not aware of anything else around them.

These smartphones are not making our youth smart. They are generating a generation that have lost all awareness of their surroundings. Our youth are evolving into a stooped and disconnected species that, before long, will see us go back to the glory days of the ape’s posture.

Conversing with them involves great complexity. Once you speak to them, and if they notice your lips moving, they have to go through the complex routine of taking their earphones out, displaying irritation and then offering an irritated, ‘What?’

Our young people live in a world of apps, likes and social media. Unfortunately the medium is not very social. Xavier McCullough, Limerick.