Afraid of Losing Your Mobile Phone? There's Help!

A new study conducted by security-authentication company SecurEnvoy finds that fear of losing your phone is a common ailment. About 66 percent of those surveyed suffer from nomophobia (or “no mobile phone phobia”); interestingly, more women worry about losing their phone than men.
Last year, a study in the journal of Personal and Ubiquitous Computing found that respondents checked their phone about 34 times per day on average. Those surveyed would check their phone about once every ten minutes. We’re all a little too obsessive about our gadgets, it seems.
 Lookout Mobile Security also did a study late last year and found that 50 percent of respondents feel anxious when they do not have their phone present. When asked which item they would retrieve from a burning house, the top pick was a mobile phone -- ahead of a wallet, purse or a passport.
Fortunately, there’s a solution.

Some of the treatments she recommends are similar to those for treating obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and anxiety attacks: leaving the phone behind and not checking e-mail or text messages, and then learning to tolerate the subsequent anxiety. Even if this leads to a high level of worry and stress, she says(Ramani Durvasula, a clinical psychologist and professor at California State University in Los Angeles), the solution is to push through the fear and learn to cope with not having your phone.
Of course, there are also technological options. Luis Levy, a co-founder at Novy PR, says he uses an app called Cerberus that can automatically track the location of his phone. To find it, he can just go to a Web site, login, and see the device’s location.