Quick answer: To stop doomscrolling, take time to analyze your smartphone/social media use, have alternative options for filling your free moments during the day, look for the good news in your social media feeds, set rules for the amount of time you spend scrolling, and check in with your emotions before and after you start scrolling.
Key Points:
- Chronic doomscrolling is associated with decreased prosocial behavior and characteristics.
- High level of doomscrolling is associated with increased psychological distress, emotional difficulty, and mental health symptoms
- Specific demographic groups are at higher risk of doomscrolling – and you may be surprised at which groups are at highest risk
Connected and Online: Our New Normal
Total connectivity in our modern world is a blessing and a curse: on the one hand, instant access to vast amounts of information makes our lives easier on a variety of levels, but on the other hand, most of us know how easy it is to get caught in a loop of unhealthy behavior that’s difficult to escape – doomscrolling – and while many of us want to stop doomscrolling, many of us don’t know exactly how to go about doing it.
In this article, we’ll define what we mean by doomscrolling, discuss its association with negative mental health outcomes, identify demographic groups at-risk groups of doomscrolling, and review current social media and internet use trends that contribute to doomscrolling. We’ll close with a list of helpful tips on how to stop or reduce time spent doomscrolling.
What is Doomscrolling?
We’ll use information from one of the first peer-reviewed journal studies on doomscrolling – “The Dark at the End of the Tunnel: Doomscrolling on Social Media Newsfeeds” – throughout this article. Here’s how the authors of that publication define doomscrolling:
“Doomscrolling is a unique media habit where social media users persistently attend to negative information in their newsfeeds about crises, disasters, and tragedies.”
Previous research shows doomscrolling is a specific, distinct, and unique behavior. However, doomscrolling bears close resemblance to at least four additional internet-related behaviors associated with negative mental health consequences:
1. Excess online vigilance.
This is defined as:
“…permanent cognitive orientation towards online content and communication as well as their disposition to exploit these options constantly.”
2. Problematic internet use,
This is defined as:
“…a maladaptive preoccupation with internet use, seen as an irresistible urge to use it for longer periods of time than planned, which results in significant distress or damage of functioning as a result of internet use, with an absence of psychiatric disorder that could explain excessive use, such as mania or hypomania.”
3. Problematic social media use.
While there is no agreed upon definition for problematic social media use, studies show mental health experts can agree on the following:
“Problematic social media use refers to a maladaptive use of social media that may have a detrimental effect on personal, social, and/or professional lives of the social media user.”
4. Fear of missing out (FOMO).
This is defined as:
“…a phenomenon observed on social networking sites that includes the perception of missing out and a compulsive behavior to maintain connections on social media. FOMO is accompanied by pervasive apprehension that others might be having rewarding experiences from which one is absent, often experienced as a range of negative emotions and feelings related to the need to belong.”
That’s what doomscrolling is, and those are the behaviors doomscrolling is related to, according to the experts. Now let’s take a look at the consequences of doomscrolling.
Doomscrolling and Mental Health: What’s the Problem?
Published soon after the study we present above, the paper “Doomscrolling Scale: Its Association with Personality Traits, Psychological Distress, Social Media Use, and Wellbeing” shows both positive and negative associations with doomscrolling. Note: negative association in this context means with more doomscrolling, you see the less of these, while positive association means with more doomscrolling, you see the more of these.
The researchers identified negative associations between doomscrolling and the following:
- Conscientiousness
- Extraversion
- Agreeableness
- People who score high on agreeableness scales are less likely to engage in problematic phone use, e.g. doomscrolling
The researchers identified positive associations between doomscrolling and the following:
- Neuroticism, which increases the likelihood of:
- Emotional instability
- Psychological distress
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Low self-esteem
- Sensation-seeking
- Negativity bias
- Passive social media use
- Chronic media use
- Impulsivity
Individuals at highest risk for doomscrolling include:
- Men
- Young adults
- People with high level of political engagement
All those outcomes make sense to a layperson, and align with previous research on problematic internet use, defined as being online – outside of work or school – for 3.5 hours or more per day. However, the individuals at risk of doomscrolling – as defined in this article – are completely different than individuals at risk of the negative consequences of heavy internet use. Whereas young females who engage in chronic negative comparison on social media are most vulnerable to its negative consequences, men and young adults with a high level of political engagement are most vulnerable to the negative mental health consequences associated with doomscrolling.
To learn more about the various mental health, emotional, social, and psychological problems associated with problematic internet use in general, a slightly different topic than doomscrolling, please navigate to our blog and read these articles:
Can Social Media Change the Brain?
Does Social Media Harm Mental Health?
Next, we’ll look at the prevalence of smartphone and social media use among adults in the U.S.
Does Everyone Have a Smartphone? And Use Social Media, Too?
Yes, nearly every adult in the U.S. says they have a smartphone, and a large percentage of adults in the U.S. say they use social media every day. Let’s take a look at these statistics, published by Pew Research on the online resource “Fact Sheets: Tech Adoption Trends – Mobile, Social Media.”
First, the data on smartphone ownership and use:
Smartphone Ownership, by Age Group
(% of population that owns and uses a smartphone)
- 18-29: 98%
- 30-49: 97%
- 50-64: 91%
- 65+: 79%
Social Media Use: Adults 18+
(We include YouTube here, since YouTube plays a significant role in the online lives of males who report a high level of political engagement)
- YouTube: 89.3%
- Instagram: 78%
- Facebook: 67%
- TikTok: 62%
Social Media Use, By Age Group
- YouTube:
- 18-29: 93%
- 30-49: 94%
- 50-64: 86%
- 65+: 65%
- Instagram:
- 18-29: 76%
- 30-49: 66%
- 50-64: 36%
- 65+: 19%
- Facebook:
- 18-29: 68%
- 30-49: 78%
- 50-64: 70%
- 65+: 59%
- TikTok: 62%
- 18-29: 59%
- 30-49: 50%
- 50-64: 26%
- 65+: 10%
Those statistics make it clear: through our relationship with smartphones and our online behavior, we’re all at risk of chronic social media use, excess internet use, and doomscrolling. But how can we change this behavior?
Stop Doomscrolling: Top Tips and Tricks
Here’s something you probably already know but need to see in writing: mindful awareness of your behavior and its consequences is the first step in learning to stop doomscrolling. We’ll elaborate in our list of helpful tips below, which we adapted from excellent information provided by the Cleveland Clinic and the Mayo Clinic Press.
That’s another way of saying the first step to solving a problem is admitting there’s a problem. Consider this: doomscrolling can become such an ingrained habit in our lives that we may not realize what we’re doing, or understand that what we’re doing may have a negative impact on our overall happiness, peace of mind, and wellbeing.
Starting from there – mindful awareness of your smartphone/social media/online behavior – we offer the following list of tips to help you stop doomscrolling.
How To Stop Doomscrolling: Our Top Five Tips
1. Identify the Why.
When you feel the impulse to reach for your phone, stop and ask yourself three questions:
- Why am I reaching for my phone?
- Is my reason time sensitive, i.e. do I really need to look at my phone now?
- Is there a downside to not looking at my phone right now?
If your answers are “I don’t know,” “No, not really,” and “No,” then either don’t pick up your phone, or set it back down, and refer to our next tip.
2. Have Other Options Ready.
You may reach for your phone to check in on a hobby or interest. For instance, if you’re passionate about photography, you may jump on your phone to see what’s happening in your favorite photography chat group or forum, and then it happens.
The notifications get you.
You picked up your phone to see if someone replied to your question on a photography forum. As soon as you look at your screen, you see activity on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, new email in your work and personal accounts, plus your phone just updated and wants you to explore all the awesome new features.
Half an hour later, you remember why you picked up the phone: to check on that post you made. But instead, you hopped on Facebook and started doomscrolling. Here’s how to avoid that: have non-phone options related to your hobbies or passions at the ready. For instance, we suggest books. A book on your hobby can satisfy your immediate interest without distracting you into doomscrolling, taking your valuable time, and leading to negative mental health consequences.
Also, turn off all notifications, push and otherwise, from all nonessential apps, now.
3. Identify Your Emotions.
Next time you pick up your phone, stop for a moment and get in touch with your current emotional state, i.e. how you feel right now. Then, after spending time on your phone, stop for another moment and take inventory again:
How do you feel now? If worse, why? If better, why?
Is the change in your emotional state related to scrolling on your phone?
When you answer those questions, connect the answers to the specifics of your scrolling. If you feel worse, that’s a sign that what you were just doing may count as doomscrolling and can lead to negative emotional states. Then, go further. Ask yourself exactly what sites you visited and what kind of content did you spent time on and use that information to help you avoid doomscrolling the next time you pick up your phone.
4. Look for Good News
If your answers to the self-questions in the item above were positive, you can use that information proactively. Think about the sites you visited, the content you spent time on, and why you felt better instead of worse afterward.
For instance, if you just looked at pictures of your cousin’s healthy newborn child, make a note: happy pics of family can improve my mood. And if you just laughed your head off at ridiculous memes, or got excited about a new aspect of your favorite hobby, make a note: laughing out loud and checking out things related to hobbies or passions are not doomscrolling, and can improve my mood.
Reconsider following any news sites at all on social media, and make a shift to consuming news in a context that’s not designed to amplify sensational content.
In place of news sites, consider following groups, people, and organizations working to make a positive impact in the world, or groups – as we keep repeating – that focus on interests or passions you know enrich your life and bring you joy.
5. Set Parameters
Once you gather information from the step above, use what you know to set guidelines for how you use your phone. Think about setting personal rules or goals for:
- How much time you spend total per day
- How much time you spend each time you pick up your phone for nonessential purposes
- What kind of content you consume
- How you consume it: video, pictures, articles, audio
- When you consume it: content can affect you differently at different times
A simple way to start this habit is with an alarm: next time you pick up your phone, set a timer for five minutes. You’ll be shocked how fast five minutes can pass these days. Seriously though, try that: it’s lesson one in learning how you can easily fall into hours-long rabbit holes on social media.
If You Can’t Stop Doomscrolling, Seek Professional Support
If you can’t stop doomscrolling, you have another option. You can seek the help of a mental health professional. If you arrange a full psychiatric evaluation administered by a qualified psychiatrist or therapist, they can help you determine if there’s a root cause – a mental health disorder, for instance – that contributes to your difficult relationship with social media content.
Keep in mind that currently, there’s no official diagnosis for social media addiction or general internet addiction. However, the support you receive from a mental health professional can help you identify a problem behavior you want to reduce or eliminate – e.g. doomscrolling – and give you the tools you need to resolve the patterns of thought or emotion that contribute to that behavior, which can lead to reducing or eliminating that behavior.
Therefore, if you can’t stop doomscrolling on your own, we encourage you to consider professional support: it might be exactly what you need.