Scrolling through TikTok, YouTube’s ‘shorts’ videos or Instagram’s ‘reel’ section can impair our brain functions more than moderate alcohol consumption.

As with the latter, of course, it is the dose that makes the poison. But the data confirm it: short videos induce spikes of dopamine – the neurotransmitter associated with pleasure – that over-stimulate the brain’s reward pathways, in a similar way to alcohol consumption and gambling, leading us to develop a similar addiction.

Effects on the brain

Excessive stimulation of the dopamine system causes loss of self-control and an inability to concentrate on anything that does not offer immediate gratification. By bombarding us with stimuli, scrolling activity in fact causes important functional changes in our brain circuits, although without causing direct physical damage to the cells (and this is what distinguishes it from alcohol abuse).
One speaks, in this case, of ‘rewiring’ of circuits.

MRI data suggest a link between intense and prolonged binge-watching of short videos and a thinning of the prefrontal cortex. This is an area crucial for self-control, attention and awareness in decision-making, all the more so if it is damaged before its full maturation (i.e. around the age of 25).

Dysfunctions of thehippocampus are also documented, negatively affecting sleep quality and memory.

Scholars agree from East to West

This is what emerges from several peer-reviewed studies published in NeuroImage, including one led by Professor Qiang Wang of Tianjin Normal University, as well as from the Chinese Zhejiang University study focusing on the effects of Douyin (Chinese version of TikTok).
Also significant is the research conducted by Angeline Lillard at the University of Virginia, which identified deficits in gratification and immediate learning ability in children exposed to very fast videos.

In short, days spent in front of screens from an early age are threatening the cognitive development of an entire generation.

‘Digital dementia’: not an insult but a technical condition

A clear and universal safe threshold for scrolling has not yet been identified, but experts estimate that beyond 2-3 hours a day, one enters a condition of ‘digital intoxication’, risking chronic negative effects on memory, impulse control ability and sleep.
From there, it is a short step to what is called ‘digital dementia’.

Imagine the state of mind of someone who has wasted an afternoon scrolling through TikTok, viewing dozens or perhaps hundreds of very short pieces of content, without then remembering a single one.
Do they feel fulfilled or ‘switched off’?

The answer is what you have all been thinking.
By spending hours binge-watching fast-paced social content, we become unable to appreciate the ‘normal’ times in life, the slow rewards, the daily actions that lead to real results with commitment and patience. Our mental health deteriorates and our mood fades, resulting in a state of malaise that can lead to depression.

In addition to causing serious damage to individual health, such a drastic lowering of the attention threshold and such a widespread inability to concentrate on stimuli that do not provide immediate gratification are constituting a social problem, as serious as it is underestimated.
And the progressive shortening of videos circulating on the net (as well as in general of all content intended for the anonymous public) is a symptom, and not just a cause, of this problem.

We are faced with a phenomenon that is far-reaching precisely because it feeds on itself, in the indifference of those who profit from it or even exploit it for their own hybrid war campaign, as in the case of China with TikTok.

Labelling videos like cigarettes?

In a democratic society, the widespread dissemination of critical thinking, creative thinking, active learning, reasoning and problem-solving should be fundamental.

We have created an interconnected and increasingly ‘smaller’ world, which has made the challenges of our time more complex, but our minds are less and less able to cope with complexity.
How can we have, for example, control of artificial intelligence, if we lose natural intelligence?
There is nothing original in this question, but perhaps there is much that is real.

To combat the epidemic of ‘digital dementia’, institutions can only give a structural and effective long-term response: promote real, concrete digital education that focuses on awareness and responsibility, and not just on prohibition.

Perhaps, if we really went in this direction, in the future the label ‘seriously harms health’ might appear as a mantra before every brain-rot video.
It could really appear as a legal requirement, or, better still, it could just resonate in our minds, urging us to give up the mobile phone and spend that minute and a half of our lives better.