A new study released by Deloitte confirms we are a nation of phone obsessed multi-taskers, with American consumers looking at their smartphones in the aggregate eight billion times per day and increasingly doing so while engaged in other activities like watching television, shopping, and even while talking to friends and family.

The fifth edition of Deloitte's "2015 Global Mobile Consumer Survey" uncovered many other interesting findings around American behavior, trends, and general lifestyle shifts associated with the unprecedented usage of mobile devices today. These include:

Consumers are more distracted than ever before...

This year's survey results show unprecedented levels of multitasking while interacting with mobile devices, which has translated into consumers being more distracted than ever before.

    Sixty one percent of American consumers indicate that they sometimes, if not often, use their smartphone while out shopping.
    Forty seven percent of consumers use their smartphones while talking to friends and family.
    More than one-third of all consumers use their smartphones predominately without the prompt of an incoming message or alert.
    Contrary to common trending, the youngest demographic, age 18 to 24, didn't report the most mobile phone use while watching television "at least occasionally"—those aged 25 to 34 took the top spot.
    Text messages replaced checking emails as the first thing people do on their smartphones every day at 31 percent vs. 24 percent respectively; in fact, emails experienced the largest year over year decline of any activity.

American consumers show no signs of switching off...

The increased levels of screen time that come from consumers becoming more and more attached to their mobile devices continues to spread across generations, in both the speed at which we first look at our phone during the day, as well as the number of times we look at our phones. Consider that:

    Upon waking, 17 percent of smartphone owners, check their phones immediately, up from 14 percent a year ago, while 43 percent of consumers check their phones within five minutes, up from 39 percent a year ago.
    When it comes to bedtime, 13 percent of smartphone users look at their phone immediately before preparing to sleep, while 33 percent check their phones within five minutes before going to sleep.
    Four percent of consumers in the US look at their phones more than 200 times a day.
    Nearly half (48 percent) of consumers check their phones up to 25 times per day.
    Ninety seven percent of smartphone owners have used their phone at least once to take a photo and 74 percent to share. Interestingly, the most intense photo takers are either young (between ages of 18 to 24), or female smartphone owners who take and share photos daily.

Read the full Deloitte 2015 Global Mobile Consumer Survey.