In today's highly modernized world, technology has become a means to keep in touch. Email, video calls and chat apps are just some of the ways technology can be utilized. As much as these tech devices improve our lives, however, can they have adverse health and interpersonal effects as well?

Take our relationship with our families, for example. Do smartphones really bring us to closer, or do they just consume the time intended for our family life? A recent research has found that yes, smartphones really do have negative effects. 

A recent study claims that numerous parents nowadays who aim to address both work and family see a smartphone or a tablet as a good way to keep the balance of both careers. Sometimes, these devices result in parents being physically present while not being fully focused on their families. Thus, smartphones can be a huge distraction and they end up not even diverting stress in any way.

In a report released by Fox News, study lead author Dr. Jenny Radesky, a pediatrics researcher at the University of Michigan's C.S. Mott Children's Hospital in Ann Arbor said that whenever a new technology is publicly introduced, little by little, it becomes a source of disturbance until it gradually alters what wasn't supposed to be altered, such as family relationships. This is no different from the anxieties people felt when something new, such as the TV or telephone in the past, were introduced for the first time.

As per CBS News, Radesky has also claimed that the kind of stress that comes from keeping a well-balanced life from these emerging types of technology is something that is not new at all but was already observed from numerous people a long time ago.

Furthermore, Radesky has also added that with this kind of living, a lot of relationships are now being contained in these devices. A number of parents reportedly admitted that the use of these gadgets have the ability to change their mood and thus affecting their relationship with their child.