The cell phone has been getting a bad rap as an antisocial invention because it is a little device that emotionally isolates the user from others when they are using it. As cell phones began to have more and more of the home computer's features, plus the inception of texting and wireless internet, the ability to isolate from others has become mobile and pernicious.
But some people developed and expressed unreasonable intrusions into the lives of cell phone users. Why should a person who is shopping in a supermarket care about a person's cell phone use when they, themselves never even return a stranger's smile or friendly "hello"? What would cause a person who is not friendly towards, or who does not even know the individual, have problems when the same person is using their mobile device?
In other words, some people gripe if they even look 30 feet away to see a total stranger using a cell phone, and that is unreasonable.
In some cases, the person without the cell phone is the antisocial entity. Some people are just difficult and cell phones are not to blame. The needy neighbor who cannot stop talking and let a person move on to do their chores; the rude and aggressive acquaintance who never fails to slip in a hurtful or nasty personal attack; the nosy and aggressive gossip who is only interested in interrogating about the latest in a person's life, are examples of people who are just asking for a cell phone to come between them and their intended victims!
In the opposite direction, a person is in an unhealthy phase of obsessive and constant cell phone use. This may be caused by the newness of the device or by an emotional problem that makes them use the cell phone to isolate from others who surround them. Or, it might be that the increasing use of the cell phone by everyone else causes the person to get one of their own.
The above examples are times when the cell phone user needs to put the cell phone away for a while, so that they spend more face time with the people in their lives, including strangers. Otherwise, the skills for interacting with people who are outside of the immediate circle of friends and family will deteriorate or those skills will never become well developed in the first place.
There are plenty of people who "pretend" to be talking on the cell phone. One of the most popular smart phone applications is "fake call me", which sends a scheduled, but real call with a recorded voice on the other end to allow the person to close out an interaction with a difficult person.
The cell phone also sends a message that someone or something else is more important than the person who is right there, trying to be a friend or to interact, and this makes cell phones a way to express disdain, hostility or to take a person for granted.
But antisocial behavior goes two ways. There are people in the world who are difficult, nasty and aggressive with others. Having the cell phone allows a way to put up a barrier to interacting with them. But, if overused as a way to distract or to escape, the cell phone also prevents a person from developing natural and unaided skills for dealing with difficult people.