Sept. 12, 2025 – We didn't need another reason to put the phone down in the bathroom, but science gave us one anyway.
A new study in PLOS One has linked scrolling on the toilet to a higher risk of hemorrhoids. It's a finding that feels both obvious and unsettling. After all, smartphones already come with a litany of health baggage: disrupted sleep, anxious moods, strained eyes, stiff necks. Now, apparently, hemorrhoids too.
What is it about these glowing rectangles that makes them such fertile ground for medical findings? The short answer: Phones aren't just tools we use. They're prosthetics of daily life – the gateway to nearly everything we do. We use them to work, order food, find a date, wind down before bed, and yes, even while in the bathroom. And because they're everywhere, researchers have an endless laboratory.
As one expert – molecular geneticist Lotti Tajouri, PhD – put it, mobile phones are like "Trojan horses circulating in billions, each carrying hundreds and hundreds of microbes." Though Tajouri is referring to microbial contamination (his area of research), the metaphor resonates more broadly. We welcome phones into our lives, and like the original Trojan horse, they carry hidden dangers – whether microbes, mental health impacts, exploding batteries, or any of the many smartphone-linked health risks.
The diversity of these dangers reflects the diversity of our dependence, experts say. When something seeps into so many parts of life, it multiplies the entry points for harm.
The Body Rebels
Some smartphone health risks are obvious: eyestrain, text neck, insomnia from blue light. But the hemorrhoid study is a reminder that the physical effects can extend in unexpected directions. Long bouts of toilet scrolling keep people sitting far longer than nature intended. What once took five minutes now stretches to 20. That prolonged toilet time can lead to "potentially increasing pressure in anal tissues, which may then lead to hemorrhoids," write the study's co-authors.
Phones can also turn on us in more explosive ways. Lithium-ion batteries – the tiny, powerful engines that allow our devices to be slim and rechargeable – are volatile. A design flaw, faulty charging, or overheating can trigger a chain reaction that ends in smoke or worse, leading to burn injuries and, rarely, even death. This is why airlines now ban recalled devices and manufacturers issue emergency updates to throttle charging capacity.
Some people report headaches, rashes, fatigue, or burning sensations from being near devices – a condition called electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) thought to be caused by electromagnetic fields from sources like cellphones. While the medical community acknowledges its symptoms are real and can be crippling, the cause is debated. In 2005, the World Health Organization said EHS "has no clear diagnostic criteria" and "is not a medical diagnosis" – but can be a "disabling problem for the affected individual."
Dariusz Leszczynski, PhD, an adjunct professor of biochemistry at the University of Helsinki, has studied those who self-diagnose with the condition, and he calls it "scientifically unreliable." But while the diagnosis remains murky, the lived experience can be severe. Even if psychosomatic – caused by emotional or mental issues – it illustrates how much our bodies and phones are now linked.
Our Third (Very Dirty) Hand
If you think the bathroom study was unsettling, wait until you find out what's living on your phone. A 2022 Australian study catalogued over 11,000 organisms across 26 devices, including bacteria, fungi, and viruses. More than half carried human herpes viruses.
"Mobile phones are our third hand, constantly contaminated and ensuring our two other biological hands get contaminated over and over," said Tajouri, the lead researcher and an associate professor at Bond University, Australia. "Mobile phones actually completely negate hand-washing."
The study even found multiple herpes strains on the same device. Tajouri described seeing doctors in operating theaters handle their phones with gloved hands, and he shuddered at the infection control gap. While unlikely, cold sores (herpes type 1) and genital herpes (type 2) could spread due to phones that carry the viruses and pass them on through direct contact, Tajouri said.
Phones, in his telling, are less like neutral gadgets and more like "five-star cruise ships with free buffet heated spa" for microbes. Food particles provide nutrients. The warmth of charging keeps the surface at a body-like temperature, perfect for bacterial growth.
And unlike bathroom door handles or kitchen sponges, phones travel with us everywhere – across borders, onto airplanes, into hospitals. "We are travelling with our phones everywhere we go, which is a biosecurity issue," Tajouri warned. "In a matter of hours, we can cross the globe and carry unwanted microbial passengers with us."
His prescription: Just as handwashing became normalized in modern medicine, phone hygiene should too. He calls for widespread deployment of sanitizers using ultraviolet-C light in airports, hospitals, even restaurants. Until then, he cautions: Don't eat with your phone beside the plate.
Phantom Alerts and Altered Minds
Not all risks are surface-level. Many lurk in the nervous system, where our phones' constant buzzing and flashing are reshaping perception.
David Laramie, PhD, a clinical psychologist in Los Angeles, was among the first to study the prevalence of "phantom vibration syndrome," surveying hundreds of phone users in 2007. Two-thirds reported hearing or feeling their phone vibrate when it wasn't. "My research indicated it was correlated with high levels of use and phone salience, i.e., those who were especially connected to and reliant on their phones," he said. "Because the mind is constantly scanning and predicting for what is familiar and expected, the mind fills in the rest with the expected outcome."
For most, phantom buzzing is harmless. But newer research suggests heavier consequences for teens immersed in hyper-digital environments. A 2024 report from nonprofit research organization Sapien Labs found that 20% of 13-year-olds cited hallucinations among their worst problems, compared to 12% of 17-year-olds. Aggression, anger, and crankiness were also linked to a younger age of phone ownership. "People don't fully appreciate that hyper-real and hyper-immersive screen experiences can blur reality at key stages of development," said Austin, Texas-based addiction psychologist Nicholas Kardaras, PhD, who was not involved in the report.
Other researchers are mapping what's been informally dubbed "digital dementia" – the forgetfulness, poor concentration, and impaired multitasking linked to outsourcing memory and focus to devices. Researchers speculate the more we let our phones think for us, the less practiced our own minds become at recall and sustained attention.
And then there are delusions. Joel Gold, MD, a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine, first identified what's now called Truman Show delusion in 2003. As he explains: "Truman Show delusion is a control delusion. My brother Ian and I reckon there are 12 forms of delusion, all social in nature. … Technological shifts are often expressed in the evolution of delusional forms. Just as magnetism, mesmerism, radio- and micro-waves have populated control delusions of the past, today the idea that one is being continually watched by the entire world without consent, for entertainment purposes, can cause a sufferer to feel controlled."
Gold stressed that technology doesn't create psychosis, but flavors it. And with deepfakes and AI looming, he wonders if delusions will take even more destabilizing forms.
Relationships Under Siege
Phones don't just shape our bodies and brains; they reshape relationships. "Phubbing" – ignoring a partner in favor of your phone – is consistently linked to lower satisfaction, worse moods, and more conflict. A 2025 study noted that on days people feel phubbed, they report "lower relationship satisfaction and greater feelings of anger, resentment, and retaliation."
Attachment style plays a role. In the study, anxiously attached people felt more hurt and retaliated more when ignored. Avoidantly attached ones were less rattled but often turned to their own phones. Either way, intimacy took a hit.
It gets worse: A 2024 SellCell survey found that 54% of people would rather spend time with their smartphone than their partner, and 75% admitted to spending up to 30 minutes on their phone during a romantic date. Twelve percent confessed they would interrupt sex to check their phone.
Nomophobia – the panic of losing signal or battery – adds another relational wrinkle. A 2021 review of more than 100 studies on the concept found signs ranged from anxiety and sweating to compulsively carrying multiple chargers. For some, the phone becomes less a convenience than a protective amulet, insulating them from face-to-face contact.
And then there's cyberchondria, the modern twist on hypochondria. Market research suggests that about half of Americans have self-diagnosed a medical condition online. In Quartz, psychologist Mary Aiken cautioned that the trend can disrupt the diagnostic process by exposing patients to "rare or morbid conditions … which in turn can prompt the appearance of new 'symptoms.'"
So What Do We Do?
No one is giving up their phone. But experts offer simple interventions: sanitize devices regularly (use a cotton ball soaked in rubbing alcohol), rethink bathroom scrolling, unplug at night, and be mindful of how much you reach for your screen when someone you love is in the room.
Gold, the New York University associate professor, offered advice that could apply as much to mild anxiety as to full-blown delusion: "Put your phone away. Shut off your computer. Get some exercise. Go for a nature walk. And keep connected socially. See people. In real life."
The lesson isn't paranoia. It's perspective. Smartphones aren't killing us wholesale. But they're constantly reshaping us – physically, mentally, socially – in ways worth noticing. And as long as they remain our third hand, our umbilical cord, our bedroom companion, researchers will keep finding new and bizarre health hazards.
The real surprise isn't that there are so many ways phones are unhealthy. It's that, even knowing all this, we still can't bring ourselves to put them down.