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Your phone may be hurting your relationship more than you realize
One of you is telling the story of their day. The other says "mm-hm", eyes on the screen, thumb still scrolling. After a while the story stops halfway through a sentence. Nobody says anything, and the evening carries on.
There's a word for this: "phubbing", made from "phone" and "snubbing". Most of us didn't need the word to know the feeling.
Reading this on an app's blog is a little ironic, we know. It's still worth writing about, because a phone can connect two people across a continent just as easily as it can come between two people on the same sofa.
What the research says
A study published in the US in 2016 asked adults in relationships how often their partner got absorbed in their phone while they were together. People who said their partner snubbed them for the phone also reported more conflict over phone use and less satisfaction with the relationship (the study). According to the university's announcement, 46 percent of participants said their partner phubbed them, and 23 percent said it caused conflict between them (Baylor University).
Another study from the same year even coined its own word for it: "technoference", technology interfering with time together. In this one, 62 percent of 143 married and cohabiting women said technology interfered with their free time together (BYU). Those who said it happened more often also reported more conflict and less satisfaction in the relationship (the study).
Both are survey studies, so neither proves that phones damage relationships. It could also be that people in unhappy relationships escape into their phones more. Whichever way it runs, evenings spent looking at screens and relationships that feel unhappy tend to turn up together.
The small invitations you miss
Psychologist John Gottman calls the little reaches partners make toward each other during the day "bids for connection". "Look at this", "guess what happened today", pointing at a bird outside the window. Turning toward these bids and answering them is one of the things that keeps a relationship going. We go into that more in our post on why relationships end.
Phones are the quietest way to miss them. There's no bad intent, the eyes are just somewhere else. But every missed "look at this" makes the next one a little harder to say.
Agreements, not bans
You can't take the phone out of your life, and you don't need to. For a long-distance couple, the phone is the relationship. Deciding together when it stays off the table is enough.
A few simple agreements work for a lot of couples. No phones at the dinner table. No phones in bed, or at least not in the last half hour before the lights go off. When one of you is telling a story, the screen goes dark. These only work if you both keep them; a rule one person enforces on the other soon turns into a new thing to fight about.
If you need to check your phone, say what you're doing. "Mom just texted, let me answer quickly" feels very different from silently disappearing into the screen. Your partner sees the same thing but doesn't feel shut out.
Who are your notifications working for?
Most of the moments we pick up the phone aren't our decision; the notifications decide. Try switching off social media notifications in the evenings. Just noticing how often you reach for the phone for no reason is surprising.
On Tomurcuk, there's one question a day. You write your answer and send it, the seal opens once your partner has written theirs, and then you can put the phone down and keep talking about the same question face to face. We think that's an app at its best, doing its job and getting out of the way.
For tonight
A light question from the Tomurcuk bank, though the answer says something: "Which would you pick: a week without your phone, or a week without dessert?" Both of you answer, then leave the phones in another room for the rest of the evening. All you'll miss is a few notifications.