Phones must be orders if magnitudes more common than newspapers. It seems that no matter where you are in the world, everyone from age 12 and up has one on them 24/7 and uses it as soon as they have 20 seconds to spare. Newspapers were something only a few adults would use, and you usually have read all the interesting parts by the time you get your second coffee.

I agree that the tendency for wanting distractions has always been present in humans, but the hyper connectivity of today's world really taps into it unlike anything else we had before. It's a different quality.