Conversely, recent research suggests that many college students perceive the cell phone primarily as a leisure device, and most commonly use cell phones for social networking, surfing the Internet, watching videos, and playing games (Lepp, Li, & Barkley, 2015; Lepp, Barkley, Sanders, Rebold, & Gates, 2013). If typically utilized for leisure rather than education, then cell phones may disrupt learning within academic settings (Levine, Waite, & Bowman, 2007).

Popular activities such as playing video games, surfing the Internet, and monitoring social media sites are now all easily accomplished with most cell phones. Researchers have linked each of these activities, independent of cell phone use, to academic performance. For example, heavy video game playing has been associated with lower GPAs (Jackson, von Eye, Fitzgerald, Witt, & Zhao, 2011; Jackson, von Eye, Witt, Zhao, & Fitzgerald, 2011). Also, low levels of Internet use have been associated with improved academic performance (Chen & Peng, 2008).Chen and Tzeng (2010) found that among heavy Internet users information seeking was associated with better academic performance, while video game playing was associated with lower levels of academic performance.

This study assessed the relationship between cell phone use and actual college grade point average (GPA) after controlling for known predictors