Are you suffering from Selfitis?

Look around the next time you’re at a restaurant, in a metro, or at any public place and you’ll see toddlers on iPads, kids posting on Instagram, and adults who place their phones right next to their plates, ready to pick at the first ring. Selfie causes mental disorder.

Often, we get to see people taking their selfies to post on social media. All of us are aware of what selfie culture is. But, what comes as a shock is that people have met with accidents while taking selfies. Is taking a selfie that important? Who are the people who risk their life while taking selfies?

Let us look at some data to get a better idea about the fatal accidents that have taken place while taking selfies. According to Wikipedia, in the year 2014, which is also called, the year of the selfie, it was approximated by The United States Department of Transportation, the number of people who were hurt or injured while driving and using a mobile phone were 33,000.

They were either “talking, listening,” or involved in “manual button/control actuation’ including taking, uploading, downloading, editing, or opening of selfies.” (List of selfie-related injuries and deaths. “n.d”)

A survey was also done by an agency, Erie Insurance Group, in the year 2015 according to which 4% of drivers confirmed that they took selfies while driving at some point of time.

3.1.1 What is a mental health disorder?

According to American Psychiatric Association, any change in behaviour, emotion, thinking, or a combination of these three is called mental illnesses. The symptoms characteristic of mental illnesses are distress and/or problems functioning in social, work or family activities.

Mental health is the foundation for emotions, thinking, communication, learning, resilience and self-esteem. Mental health is also key to relationships, personal and emotional well-being and contributing to community or society. (Psychiatry, Psychiatry.org) Examples of mental illness include depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorders and addictive behaviours.

Sarah Knapton, a science editor, has written an article on an online news portal. The Telegraph, to describe a new type of mental disorder i.e. selfitis. The main idea of this text is to explain selfitis.

She has written it to elaborate upon what selfitis is, how it can be measured, the tool to measure it, how it was discovered, the characteristics of the people who suffer from this disorder, etc.