12 April 2009
For the study, Safura Karim interviewed 318 of the 320 South African teens at two city high schools who used mxit or similar text message forums on their cellphones.
Just over half of the group had at least one of the primary symptoms of repetitive strain injury: pain or tingling in their necks, hands or back. The results showed that a total of 125 of the teens reported blisters on their fingers after engaging in messaging.
“The thumb is the least dextrous of all our fingers and is not suited to the repetitive movements required to type on a cellular phone keypad,” 24.com quoted Karim as saying.
The study has been published in the latest issue of the SA Medical Journal.
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