From phubee to phubber: the transmission of phone snubbing behavior between marital partners

Abstract

Purpose

The ubiquity of mobile phone use has generated a common phenomenon called phubbing, a reference to snubbing someone in social settings and instead concentrating on one's phone. Despite numerous adverse effects of phubbing argued in previous research, the group of phubbers is growing intensively. The purpose of this study is to investigate the potential transmission of phubbing between marital partners to raise public awareness of the propagation of phubbing.

Design/methodology/approach

A two-wave study with a 3-month interval was conducted, using matched husband–wife data from 253 Chinese couples. Husbands and wives separately completed questionnaires about their spouses’ phubbing and their marital quality. The dyadic data analysis method was applied to test the research hypotheses.

Findings

The results confirm the transmission of phubbing and show a pronounced gender asymmetry in the process of phubbing transmission. Phubbing could be transmitted from wives to husbands, but not vice versa. Specifically, only wives' phubbing significantly undermine relationship quality, while relationship quality was negatively related to both husbands' phubbing and wives' phubbing.

Originality/value

This study contributes to a better understanding of the mechanism of phubbing transmission and provide support for reciprocity theory and social role theory. Results can cause public attention to the transmissibility of phubbing and provide enlightenment on the management of personal phone behavior and offer insight into research on technology use in other types of interpersonal relationships.

Citation

Chen, Z., Gong, Y. and Xie, J. (2022), "From phubee to phubber: the transmission of phone snubbing behavior between marital partners", Information Technology & People, Vol. 35 No. 4, pp. 1493-1510. https://doi.org/10.1108/ITP-03-2020-0150