Beyond the Digital Detox

So many of us feel addicted to the endless doomscrolling we seem to get sucked into and want to find ways to be more disciplined about our screen time in the next year. A popular resolution each new year is to do a "digital detox" - a plan to to either reduce or completely stop your use of digital technology or social media for a set period of time to reset your system, reduce negative mental health effects, and promote healthier habits.

But studies are mixed on the benefits of digital detoxes [1] . Outcomes depend on how much a person used their devices before the study, how they implemented the detox, and how long it lasted. It's often impossible in our modern world to do a complete detox; therefore they usually last only a short time, rebounds or post-detox binges are common, and follow-up studies on whether the effects are long-lasting are still needed [2] .

The problem with digital detoxes

The issue with digital detoxes is that it puts the blame on us - it suggests that the issue is just that we have insufficient willpower and we could put our phones down at any time if we really wanted to. This completely ignores the deliberatively manipulative design of the apps we open again and again compulsively.

There are literally 1000s of engineers, product managers, and behavioral researchers whose job it is to design the apps we use to be as addictive as possible. They don't frame it that way of course - that would sound evil. Instead they set goals of maximizing "engagement" with the app, which is just corporate speak for getting you to use it as much a possible. More on this later, but the main thing to takeaway is that the people building these apps know that feeding you endless junk food entertainment or ragebait will keep you using the app more and more, so they tweak their algorithms to show you more and more of this type of content to keep you scrolling for as long as possible.

But this begs the question: if the apps we use every day to keep in touch with our friends and family were designed with the goals of connection and healthy communication in mind, would we have the same problems with addiction, mental health, and increasing polarization that leads us to need to take a break from them in the first place?

A future of intentionally designed apps

We shouldn't need to develop cumbersome behavioral hacks to feel in control of our digital lives. We need apps designed for sensible use, not maximum use. This is definitely possible. The apps we already use that are designed this way - such as a calculator or photo roll app - don't lead us to compulsively open them the same way the addictively-designed ones do.

As users we need to demand that the apps we use every day stop manipulating us. We can do this by giving feedback to the makers of the app, petitioning our governments to introduce laws banning or limiting manipulative design patterns, and deleting or deactivating accounts on addictively-designed platforms in favor of more neutral ones.

If we want a future where we feel less manipulated and more in control, we need to invest in long-term solutions, not short-lived detoxes that put us right back where we started.

Citations

[1] Digital detox: An effective solution in the smartphone era? A systematic literature review - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/epub/10.1177/20501579211028647

[2] Taking a Break: The Effects of Partaking in a Two-Week Social Media Digital Detox on Problematic Smartphone and Social Media Use, and Other Health-Related Outcomes among Young Adults - https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10740995/#sec4-behavsci-13-01004