Half of All Americans Are Now Checking Their Smart Phones 150 Times a Day

Fresh new data from the Pew Research Center reveals that a clear majority of American adults are now smart phone owners. A full 56% of America use iPhones, Androids, and the like as their primary phone. That is approximately 176 million people. The bulk of the users are either in their twenties and thirties, or skew affluent.

As you can see, the adoption rate has been nothing short meteoric—smart phone ownership shot up from 35% to 56% in just two years.

So what is half of America going to do with its new grip of smart phones? Check them compulsively, of course.

A number of other studies have found that the average smart phone user checked his or her phone 150 times a day.

Nokia first reported the number in 2010, but T-Mobile confirmed the stat as recently as last January.

After the most recent debriefing, Newsweek published this graph that breaks down how, exactly, we're spending that time buried in our phones. Somewhat surprisingly, voice calls still nudge out everything but messaging, and plain old time-checking made a strong showing.

Some of those numbers seem fishy to me—who checks an alarm 8 times a day?—but taken as a whole, it seems pretty accurate. Low-balled, even.

And that, increasingly, is what our nation is now doing in tandem. Over scores of millions of Americans are now whittiling their days away, checking their smart phones scores of times. That's you and me included. It's hard, in fact, to think of anything besides television-watching that has so united the nation.