Women reported higher actual percentages of social smartphone use compared to men, while men reported higher actual percentages of entertainment use. However, these sex differences were only found when comparing actual use percentages obtained from screen time data, not estimated use percentages self-reported by participants. In general, social use was underestimated and entertainment use was overestimated for both women and men when relying on estimated use percentages rather than actual data.

1. INTRODUCTION
• Social uses (e.g., social media) are more prevalent
in women than men, whereas process uses (e.g.,
entertainment) are more prevalent in men than
women (van Deursen et al., 2015).
• However, these sex differences may not emerge in
estimates of smartphone use given the inaccuracies
in reporting the number and types of online use
(Andrews et al, 2015; Araujo et al., 2017).
METHODS
• Participants: Undergraduate iPhone users age 18
to 35; N = 189, (111 Women; 78 Men)
• Procedures: Participants estimated the percentage
of smartphone usage for each of the iPhone
categories. Then using the iPhone screen-time
feature, participants indicated the weekly time
spent per category in hours and minutes, which
were converted into actual use percentages.
RESULTS & DISCUSSION
• Consistent with Van Deursen et al. (2015), social
uses were greater for women than men, but with
the opposite pattern for entertainment uses.
• However, this sex difference was obtained in the
actual but not the estimated percentages, thereby
further underlying the importance of using actual
rather than estimated reports.
Zahra Alkhayat, Fatima Naeem, Rida Waseem,
Gregory A. Norville, and Lara L. Jones, PhD
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24
16
40
52
28
23
0.00
10.00
20.00
30.00
40.00
50.00
60.00
70.00
Estimated (%) on
Social Uses
Actual (%) on
Social Uses
Estimated (%) on
Entertainment
Actual (%) on
Entertainment
Sex Differences in Social and Entertainment Smartphone Use
Women (n = 111)
Men (n = 78)
p = .88 p = .002 p = .10 p = .016
*
*
Percentage
of
Smartphone
Use
Sex differences were found for actual (but
not estimated) social and entertainment
use. Women reported a higher percentage
of social use, while men reported a higher
use of entertainment.
Sex Differences in Estimated vs.
Actual Smartphone Use
Social
52%
Health
&
Fitness
1%
Games
5%
Entertain.
23%
Productivity
6%
Reading &
Reference
5%
Education
2%
Creativity
4%
Other
2%
Men-Actual Smartphone Use(%)
Social
62%
Health &
Fitness
1%
Games
4%
Entertain.
16%
Productivity
5%
Reading &
Reference
4%
Education
3%
Creativity
4%
Other
1%
Women-Actual Smartphone Use (%)
More Results…
Estimated vs. Actual Use
• Social use was underestimated for both women,
t(110) = 11.79, p < .001, and men, t(77) = 4.68,
p < .001.
• Entertainment use was overestimated for both
women, t(110) = 4.49, p < .001, and men, t(77)
= 2.83, p = .006.