You probably know the scene: a couple on a romantic dinner date at a nice restaurant or café. They sit across from each other, but where they should be wistfully gazing into each other’s eyes and making cute talk, they’re silent. Their heads are down, eyes transfixed to their screens. Instead of intimacy with each other, they’re having a date with their phones.

Perhaps you are or have been one of those couples. I know I have been guilty of this on occasion, and sadly, with the ubiquity of phones in our lives, it’s an all-too-common occurrence.

Does it matter so much that couples increasingly spend quality time together on their phones? Recent studies suggest that over 50% of couples experience difficulties with the frequency and amount of one or both members’ phone usage and believe phones to be a significant problem in their relationship. Studies have also shown there is a direct correlation between excessive phone use and relationship dissatisfaction. The evidence is clear that phones are intimacy killers.

I don’t want to go down the ‘all phones are bad‘ line of thought, but we do have to accept that they are inherently addictive. Phone manufacturers and app developers are constantly trying to find new ways to hack our nervous systems and capture and command our attention. Bright lights, colours and rapidly moving images attract the eye. Pop-up notifications demand urgent action and create feelings of uncertainty and anxiety that we must resolve by attending to the demanding stimuli. Phones release dopamine in users, generating interest, motivation and pleasure, which is why we find ourselves inadvertently scrolling for an hour when we only meant to respond to a message.

On an individual level, it’s important to ensure that your phone doesn’t command your life. If you think you can outwit your phone, you are mistaken. We need to be proactive in protecting ourselves from our phones’ pull. There is plenty of literature out there to support that. What often gets lost in the discussion of phone use and phone addiction is how phones show up in and affect relationships.

There is nothing inherently wrong with phone use in a relationship. Sharing reels and posts with each other is a kind of love language (trust me, I love receiving cat reels or Parks & Rec memes from the people in my life). It’s called a bid for connection, where one partner tries to share an intimate part of their world with the other in return for validation or acknowledgement. A bid for connection is like saying: look at this, it will tell you more about who I am and what I care about. It’s a means of letting partners into each other’s inner worlds.

The problem arises when over-sharing reels or compulsive phone use becomes a third in the relationship.

Relationship thirds

In relationships, anything that comes between partners is called a third. This is because it constitutes a third party, an external object, that takes attention away from the primary relationship. Thirds include things like work, children, family, hobbies, exercise, addictions and, of course, phones. Anything that can potentially interfere in a relationship can be a third.

Couples must be attentive to thirds and know how to manage them collaboratively. The main task for couples when managing thirds is knowing how to assert and protect their relationship’s boundaries from external influences.

Are phones being used as a substitute to avoid genuine intimacy? Even though they might be a way of connecting, too much time spent sharing reels or looking at phones may signal that there is something that a couple is not addressing. If you took the phone away, is there something else that you would be doing—or not doing—in the relationship? Does excessive phone use allow you to avoid having particular conversations or disguise the fact that, in other respects, you have both drifted apart and have not taken proactive steps to find meaningful ways to come back into connection?

Phone use might be a way to avoid connection or conversations or dodge the awkwardness of being in a relationship. Modern society conditions us to avoid discomfort and awkwardness at all costs. Is your phone use papering over the fact that you find it hard to deal with the mutual discomfort of getting to know each other on a deeper level? Is it the only way you know how to connect?

Another issue to consider is that phones often form one of the main communication mediums between partners at the expense of face-to-face interactions. When partners start communicating important relationship information by text or send emotionally charged messages to each other without context, it raises the likelihood of miscommunication and conflict. Nonverbal cues make up around 60-70% of communication, so the potential for error and conflict when messaging is high. Text and voice messages lack the nuances of context, gesture, and expression we usually observe when in dialogue with another person.

Phone use might also be a chronic addiction for one or both partners. This might become a problem when one partner wants to spend intimate time together and the other is glued to their phone. Have you ever experienced saying something important to someone without getting a response because they are absorbed in their phones? There is even a term for this kind of behaviour: phubbing. If those kinds of patterns or behaviours appear in relationships, it might mean that the phone has become a third and must be addressed.

Using phones consciously

The first step is to gather information. Audit your phone usage and time on individual apps each week. Then, audit your time spent sharing reels, posts, or other digital content. Ask yourselves if you are happy with the amount of time you individually and collectively spend on your phones.

Have a conversation and check in to see if phone use is covering up or helping you avoid anything in the relationship. If there’s something you’re not talking about, put the phone down and talk about it immediately.

Have a conversation about shared agreements regarding phone use in the relationship. For example, an agreement might be when one of us shares with the other, we put our phones down to show that we are paying attention.

Would you like to restrict phone use at certain times? For example, we don’t bring our phones to the dinner table or into the bedroom. Or, when we are doing relationship check-ins, we put our phones in the next room.

Are there other areas of your relationship that you want to protect from your phones?

Other Suggestions

When you go on a date, put your phones away. Agree upon a shared amount of time you will spend without going for your phones. If you don’t share finances, make a condition that if one partner pulls their phone out before the agreed time, they must pay for the date. Better yet, leave the phone in your car so you aren’t tempted.

Don’t bring phones into your bedroom or share reels in bed. Keep your phone away from the place where you sleep and make love. Likewise, keep it away from the dinner table or where you eat.

And never, ever, argue via text! If a conversation is important enough to have, it’s important enough to have it in person, where you can read each other’s cues more easily.

Bottom line

It pays to be mindful of how phone use manifests in your relationship. Phones become problematic when they get in the way of—or replace—intimacy. Be aware of your individual and mutual levels of phone use, and have honest conversations about the purpose phones serve in your relationship.

Don’t let your phones become third wheels.

If you want to develop tools to prevent phones from becoming a third party in your relationship, contact us to learn more about couples therapy and how it can help.