Screens in our Lives and in Society
By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou
Our contemporary life, especially that of young people, is closely connected with screens — those of television, cinema, computers, tablets, smartphones, and so on. Screens have deeply penetrated our lives and our society. This too is a product of electrical energy and modern technology. Their use is necessary and beneficial, but their overuse creates many problems for our health and our social interaction, because human social relationships are also disrupted. It is a common phenomenon to encounter groups of young people all looking at their smartphones and not conversing — or conversing with one another through messages — while they are together.
In a main article of a newspaper (TA NEA, 4 November 2025) titled “Screens,” the danger of excessive screen use is presented, especially among children and adolescents. It is noted at the outset that “mobile phones and tablets have unfortunately become an inseparable part of children’s everyday life.” The article then presents the results of a study by “the unit for the treatment of young people’s addiction to mobile phones and tablets" at the General Children's Hospital Panagioti and Aglaia Kyriakou, according to which a high rate of screen addiction among children is observed. Specifically, “78% of minors aged 5 to 12 use the internet, while in the age group of 10 to 12 the percentage reaches 90%.” Adolescents in particular “spend six hours a day in front of a screen, when the recommended maximum exposure time is two to three.”
The excessive use of screens also has consequences for a person’s mental and physical well-being. Research shows that “learning difficulties, inability to concentrate, and even an increase in myopia are only some of the negative consequences of a habit of the modern world.” Indeed, “experts warn that addiction of minors to screens has now taken on the dimensions of a scourge. Beyond reduced performance at school, the inability of younger students to carry out simple tasks with their hands, or more general developmental problems, doctors and psychologists also draw our attention to the psychological state of children who are dependent on electronic devices.”
We speak about the addiction of our youth to narcotic substances, but we must also sound the alarm about their addiction to screens. This means that “limits must be set” on the use of new technologies and, of course, that there must be “a healthy relationship with new technologies.” Naturally, the issue here is not only use or misuse, use or dependence, but also the fact that with new technologies the so-called “scale of values” is being dismantled, and the human being, from a free being, becomes a product and a component.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
