Screen Time and Anxiety

I think there might be a link between how we divide our screen time throughout the day (or how we take breaks between sessions, rather) and the occurrence of anxiety.

We consume a lot of information through our screens, and most of it is not the direct result of active seeking. Our minds form thoughts using these pieces of information, and perhaps our brains perceive these thoughts as forced and sudden, as there is no continuity of thought with what it was thinking before it started looking at the screen. Try to think of it as being teleported to a new, unfamiliar country with unfamiliar faces and cultures every few minutes without your prompting.

All these forced pieces of information may be perceived as "lack of control" situations because our brains don't fully understand everything they encounter. There is a lot to grasp (even though it doesn't seem like it), and since most of us don't take breaks between reading articles, consuming short-form video content, etc., our brains don't get the time to realize that most of it doesn't cause direct harm.

Imagine this short 15-second video of an artist drawing a realistic study room. Your brain is trying to find a lot of answers and make many assumptions. Who is this person? What is the nature of the person drawing this study room? What information can I gather from their voice? What is the brand of these paints? Is this brush made of real animal hair? This gold looks good there; is this brush expensive? I should study. This room they are painting from their imagination looks so peaceful to study in. I could never...

Your brain is in the middle of this trance when you scroll up out of habit (because that's what the interface is signaling you to do), and poof! You are presented with another 15-second video that your brain has to get quickly start getting accustomed to from scratch.

This might also point to another reason why short-form content is so addictive. You might experience anxiety bursts when you take even a few seconds of break from this trance, and to avoid this, you keep scrolling. Eventually, you tire out, and then you just feel guilt. However, perhaps guilt is better than anxiety for some minds, so the trade-off makes sense to them. Some people never learned to face their problems, and for them, guilt might be a better feeling than anxiety. At this point, I am just spouting what could be pure nonsense, so please take all this with a grain of salt. I am thinking as I write; this is not science.