“I want to be alone,” Greta Garbo once despaired. Not that many of us now seem to share her aspiration. Indeed, we are far more likely to be suffering from nomophobia, or the fear of being without our mobile phone.

Research carried out for The Post Office claims nomophobia affects up to 53% of mobile phone users, with 48% of women and 58% of men questioned admitting to experiencing feelings of anxiety when finding themselves deprived of network coverage, of being without battery or credit, or having forgotten their phone.

The fact is we worry about being out of the proverbial loop, of losing contact, of not knowing what’s happening, even if it is no more than for a few moments.

Socially, the impact has been profound. The absurdity of seeing two people supposedly sitting together to eat a meal in a restaurant, both holding separate conversations on their phones, is commonplace.

Similarly, a study by Lightspeed Research found that two in every three of us leave our mobiles on at night, and of those that do, only 14% switch their handset to silent.

And, were it not for the fact our precise location is now easily identifiable using mobile phone tracking websites, the numbers maintaining a nocturnal connection might be even higher.

Perversely, some must be happy to risk discovery. So terrified are we of missing a Tweet, a call or a text we clearly think nothing of having our intimacy and sleep interrupted.

We are obviously happy to sacrifice our privacy, but to what purpose?

In February, more than 100,000 of us were following Stephen Fry on Twitter. "OK,” he tweeted, “this is now mad. I am stuck in a lift on the 26th floor of Centre Point. Hell's teeth. We could be here for hours. Arse, poo and widdle," he wittily and succinctly concluded.

For Stephen Fry this minor misfortune was of minimal significance. That so many other human beings should ask to be sent such trivia is profoundly depressing. How many, you wonder, might have suffered anxiety attacks had their Tweets not been continuously and instantly forthcoming?

Fortunately, at least for nomophobiacs, network coverage is forever improving. For example, in-flight mobile provider OnAir has finally concluded agreements with Orange and Vodafone, having previously done so with O2 and T-Mobile, to enable subscribers to use their handsets in midair.

OnAir claim passengers can now stay in touch as they fly on over 8,000 flights each month, to over 240 cities in over 50 countries across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Next time you travel with Ryanair, or any of another 17 airlines, you could have the dubious delight of being deafened by a never-ending chorus of “I’m on the plane”.

As soon as 2012, according to Sita's Airline IT Trends Survey 2009, no less than 70% of the 116 global airlines surveyed say they intend to introduce Wi-Fi and GSM/GPRS connectivity for short haul flights, and around 65% for long haul flights.

As Obi-Wan Kenobi said to Luke Skywalker in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi: “You cannot escape your destiny.”

Yet all hope is not completely lost.

British Airways is one airline that has no plans to allow voice calls on their flights. Chief Executive Willie Walsh recently explained: “The research we have done on voice tells us that the vast majority of customers do not want it. It is not impossible but there is no demand for that product."

The courts would seem to agree. An aircraft engineer who refused to switch off his mobile phone on an EasyJet flight between Stansted and Edinburgh, and then shouted and swore at cabin crew, was last week fined £1,000.

And in the United States Representative Peter A. DeFazio, a Democrat from Oregon, has introduced legislation to promote peace and quiet on planes. Called the HANG UP Act (Halting Airplane Noise to Give Us Peace Act), DeFazio reportedly contends that uncontrolled yakking can turn a flight into a sentence to hell.

But most encouraging of all, and notwithstanding the nomophobiacs, nearly two-thirds of Londoners don't want mobile phone access on the Tube, according to a poll for thelondonpaper.com.

Perhaps there really is a time and a place. After all, who genuinely wants to hold a conversation while straphanging with both a short sweaty stranger nestled next to their armpit and an abundant Afro blocking their nose?