A survey asking 450 adults about the relational effects of phubbing found that "when someone perceived that their partner phubbed them, this created conflict and led to lower levels of reported relationship satisfaction," said James A. Roberts, a marketing professor at Baylor University in Texas.

That meant lower levels of life satisfaction "and, ultimately, higher levels of depression."

FOMO, or fear of missing out, makes you check and recheck your phone for updates, notifications and news. It's a difficult impulse to control, and no wonder. It comes from the most primitive part of your brain: the amygdala, whose job is to detect whether your life is under threat and activate the fight or flight response.

Clinical psychologist Anita Sanz explains on Quora that back in the cave days when people roamed around in small groups, species survival hinged on being in the know. To not be aware of a food source, for example, meant "literally missing out on something that could mean the difference between life and death".

So even though liking someone's Facebook post, or whether or not your tweets are retweeted is far from a life and death matter, FOMO puts you in the same stressed, hypervigilant state as, say, running from a sabre-toothed tiger.

"In an attempt to prevent the stress response, some people will (unfortunately) redouble their efforts not to miss out on anything, and end up in an almost constant process of "checking" behaviour," the psychologist writes.

Unless you're alone, that's phubbing. If you're with your partner, it's phubbing, the Baylor University researchers say.

Characteristic phubbing behaviours, according to the study published in the journal Computers in Human Behaviour, include placing your phone where you can see it or keeping it in your hand when you are with your partner, and glancing at it when talking to them or if the conversation lulls.

The journal article marks a major milestone in the short life of the term "phubbing" which will be celebrated in the offices of the advertising firm McCann Melbourne.

As Advertising Age reported, a group of lexicographers, poets and authors came up with it during a meeting convened by the agency at the University of Sydney in 2012 as part of a campaign to sell the Macquarie Dictionary.

McCann devised a PR strategy to help the new word on its way, with a website, StopPhubbing.com promoting a suite of "disturbing phubbing facts" such as "97 per cent of people claim their food tasted worse while being a victim of phubbing". There's also a Facebook page which has garnered 28,000 likes and numerous passionate responses.