By: Ana Maria Tofan, SFU Student

How often have you caught yourself scrolling while walking 10 steps to the kitchen for a snack? If you’re part of the generation of young adults who did not grow up glued to a screen (like me), you might like to think you’re holier than thou for having “played outside” as a kid. When tech companies spend billions of dollars to engineer the most addictive algorithms to keep our attention, is it really a surprise when it works? The reality is that these companies will stop at nothing to lock eyes into the endless loop, even when they belong to impressionable children. If we want to reclaim our mental clarity, physical health, and long-term wellness, it’s our responsibility to learn to have a healthy relationship with screens.

Here’s what research shows: spending over two hours a day in front of a screen has similar impacts on both children and adults. It harms our eyes, hinders learning and memory, and increases the risk of early neurodegeneration, the loss of neurons in the brain associated with aging. The kicker is that children’s brains are fragile and highly malleable during their early developmental years and critical periods. Excess screen time in children can delay their development in learning, communication, critical thinking, and more, leaving them with long-term difficulties. Excess screen time impacts both the quality and quantity of sleep for all ages and has even been linked to lower grey matter in our brains. For those unfamiliar with the brain, grey matter is a key component of our everyday functioning in memory, decision-making, movement, and more. So, if you’ve ever worried about Parkinson’s, dementia, or a stroke, conditions related to your brain’s grey matter, consider the things you can do to lower your risk: limit your passive screen time. 

Passive screen time can be thought of as the feeling of having a really good cupcake: it gives you an instant dopamine hit from the sugar but no nourishment.

A massive body of ever-expanding research is dedicated to the effects of screen time — particularly passive screen time. This is when you consume information through your device without engaging with it. The information or entertainment is disseminated to you from the screen, with minimal effort from the brain. Active screen time, on the other hand, involves more interactive activities or content that enriches brain activity, like educational apps or games. It is recommended parents limit children’s tech use to such activities, but adults should approach screen time the same way.

Passive screen time can be thought of as the feeling of having a really good cupcake: it gives you an instant dopamine hit from the sugar but no nourishment. Compare that with broccoli: unexciting, but good for your long-term health. This is why we frequently choose passive screen time over enriching activities: it gives your brain more delicious dopamine hits. Passive screen time has been linked with lower social interaction abilities in children and a lack of imagination, which you may have encountered if you’ve ever tried to have a conversation with an iPad kid. This is essentially like having a brain run on cupcakes. This is why many people experience brain fog with high passive screen time; it’s your brain being passive because it doesn’t have to exercise its imagination. The addictive qualities of passive screen time are especially dangerous to young children because their growing brains are drawn to the exciting colours, sounds, and movements, and the instant gratification appeals to their impatient tendencies. These tendencies are why a child is more likely to want one candy now instead of two candies later. 

So what can we do instead? First of all, just being mindful of the tiny moments where we unnecessarily use our phones can open our eyes to the reality of our dependence. Second, giving ourselves an hour in the morning without our phones can decrease our dependence over time, decrease anxiety, and improve sleep. Lastly, taking note of the ways you use your phone, and decreasing the passive, scroll-heavy ways. Screen dependencies aren’t our fault, but managing them is our responsibility, and with these steps we can begin to deconstruct the dependent routines we’ve built around our phones and start healing from scrolling sickness.