Endless scrolling, sleepless nights, and hours spent on Tiktok or Instagram leading to temporary pleasure and empty feeling asking for more? Although it might sound unfamiliar for people from older generations, it is the daily reality for most young people nowadays.

According to recent statistics (2026), an average gen-Z person reports 6.6 hours of screen time per day, while about 3 out of 10 gen-Zers spend more than 8 hours on their phones daily. Moreover, as it was found by researchers, gen-Z people tend to underestimate their daily screen-time, which is likely to create a false perception in their eyes about how much time they actually “waste” online. Another statistics (2026) shows that TikTok is currently the most used social media platform. An average global TikTok user spends around 95 minutes on this app per day, while an average gen-Zer, which is the most prevalent group on this social network, consumes 152 minutes of TikTok content every day. This rather-concerning data thus bring us to the question of why young people devote so much time to their smartphones. What is the cause of this prevailing social media craving among youngsters?

The shared answer to these questions revealed in this article concerns dopamine addiction. Dopamine can be defined as a chemical messenger which plays a crucial role in communication between the nerve cells in the brain and the body. It is associated with memory, movement, mood, motivation, sleep, attention, behavior, and cognition. Additionally, dopamine is known as a feel-good hormone, meaning that it operates on the basis of the “reward-system”. The human brain is naturally wired to do such activities which trigger the dopamine release into the neuro-system. The feeling of pleasure, which produces a lot of dopamine, comes after the ordinary practices which help us to survive, such as sleeping or eating. Excessive amount of junk food, white sugar, cigarettes, or alcohol intake becomes easily addicting, because it releases dopamine and thus satisfies our “human cravings”. The same is true for scrolling on our phones. In contemporary society, social media scrolling represents a new form of dopamine addiction.

Dopamine-scrolling is a behavioral pattern or habit of watching one video after another on social media with the intention of engaging with the new entertaining content. The main distinction between the dopamine scrolling and the doom-scrolling, though, is that those who doom-scroll view the distressing social media content or the news. While doom-scrolling is based on reward-mechnisms associated with negative emotions, dopamine-scrolling is based on reward-mechanisms connected with positive emotions.

Despite the fact that this post-scrolling feeling leaves a state of temporary pleasure in a person, when it is not restricted or limited, it might lead to various problems, including a decreased social interaction, overstimulation, and mental health issues. Even though the time spent on social media might seem quite easy to be controlled, for instance by setting time limits on a given social media platform, the opposite is often true. The content that pops up on our for-you-page is the result of sophisticated algorithms. The simple trigger in the form of a notification is enough to make us open the social media app, where after watching the first short video or reel it is really common to turn on the autopilot mode and get lost in hours-long scrolling. Now we know that it is a result of receiving the high spike of dopamine, which subconsciously pushes us to crave more and scroll to the following clip.

Therefore, next time you find yourself endlessly scrolling on any of your favorite social media platforms, try to soothe your dopamine craving in a more healthy way. Instead of being stuck in a loop of scrolling, try to go outside and feed your brain and body with a portion of fresh air. And if you are too tired to move, go talk to your family and friends, or simply try to take a nap. In addition to that, I also encourage you to set an effective app timer, which will help you to take a conscious break from these high stimulation apps. TRUST ME, YOUR BODY WILL THANK YOU LATER.

Patrícia Palajová

Sources:

2026 Survey: Do Gen Z and Millennials Have Different Phone Habits? – NumberBarn Blog

Time Spent on TikTok Statistics 2026: Daily Minutes by Age – SQ Magazine

Dopamine: What It Is, Function & Symptoms – Cleveland Clinic

Dopamine-scrolling: a modern public health challenge requiring urgent attention – PMC