BOSTON -- If you are awake you are probably online, texting or talking on a digital device. Many people think of technology as a lifeline.

"Without my phone, I'll go crazy. I'll die," said one young woman texting on her cell phone.

But could our digital attraction actually be a digital addiction? Gary Briggs, a store owner and device aficionado, wondered.

"I could put it down if I have to, but I'm not going to put it down today. So maybe I am in denial and maybe I can't live without it," said Briggs.

Briggs admits it takes him two hours every morning to get down to work. He's too busy multi-tasking: web browsing, answering e-mails, and texting on his iPhone.

"If I worked for someone else I could never do what I do during the day," said Briggs. "I could never go on the sites I go on, and I could never do the distractions that I do all day long," he said.

Scientists and psychiatrists say those distractions are not only sometimes dangerous, like multi-tasking behind the wheel, but they affect our productivity, our focus, and our relationships.

"The great paradox of modern life is we are more electronically connected than ever, but we are more inter-personally disconnected," said psychiatrist Dr. Ned Hallowell.

The constant barrage of digital information affects our brain chemistry because it increases levels of dopamine, a chemical associated with the pleasure system. Too much dopamine can make us addicted to food, sex, drugs and even technology.

"There are people who go into withdrawal," said Hallowell.

"It's not like the DT's, but there are physiological changes. They want to see their e-mail, they crave it, they miss it. When you take it away they get irritable. It gets in the way of work, romance, everything. And for what? I mean you don't have to be reached every 10 seconds," he said.

Experts say taking back control means you need to digitally decompress by shutting it all down.

"Turn it off, they do have toff buttons," said Hallowell. "Turn off the device, log off from your computer, set aside time to think, set aside time to talk with people you love. It's a matter of taking back control that we've inadvertently taken away."

But for many, that's easier said than done.

"Could I live a day or two without that? Sure," said Briggs. "But if I don't have to live a day or two without it then I'm probably going to choose not to," he said.

Hallowell said it's a matter of public health to change and control our digital habits.

"You can, you really can," said Hallowell. "I submit we must."