The Rise of Doomscrolling and its Many Consequences

The term “doomscrolling” was selected by Oxford’s Dictionary as one of 2020’s highlighted words. Ever since then, endlessly scrolling became a part of most people’s daily routine. But how did doomscrolling take over the world? And what consequences will internet users suffer? The world’s severe misuse of social media is not a coincidence: research shows people’s wellbeing has deteriorated over the years, causing anxiety on users who look for a rapid dopamine punch powered by social media platforms whose intelligent algorithms know how to keep people hooked. The consequences not only can affect a person’s mental and physical health, but research shows it might lead us into a collective cognitive deficiency.

Firstly, it is important to understand that “doomscrolling” is the prolonged and compulsive consumption of social media content. Originally, the term was used to describe the kind of scrolling a user would do until experiencing a negative emotion such as sadness, anxiety, anger, etc. Nowadays, the term is used in a broad way covering all kinds of scrolling as long as these are continuous.

When understanding this topic, it is important to look at the historical context behind it. It is believed that the action of doomscrolling existed the moment social media started, but the term was popularized in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic. This time period increased the time people spent on social media. Not only were online social platforms used for entertainment, but it was the only social interaction many people had. Additionally, people’s feeds were used as the primary source for news and information about the virus, which left behind many traditional news platforms, and made social media feeds most convenient source of information.

According to Güme (596): “While this behavior may stem form a motivation to seek information during a crisis, it gradually becomes automatic and unconscious over time.” Eventually researches found a vaccine for Covid-19 and treated most of its symptoms, but science was not able to cure the world from the social media dependency the virus had created. As time passed, people had to focus on other issues and crises that had risen around the world. This made the social media overconsumption issue seem harmless and its consequences grew unnoticeable.

Social media companies are well aware of the grasps the feed can have in a person. These feed into people’s addiction with intelligent algorithm systems designed to keep people watching and interacting with content. A lot of the information behind how these work is confidential, but data leaks have revealed that these algorithms will promote controversial content as long as it attracts more users to interact with. According to Giansiracusa (par. 14) for Time, the platforms are aware that negative content can get more people to leave a comment, so they will keep promoting that kind of content to people’s feed as long as they keep interacting with it. Ironically, this topic can be linked to Oxford Dictionary’s word of 2025: “rage bait”. The way both of these terms correlate even after five years it’s a clear example that the world is still in a social media loophole caused by its reckless consumption over the years.

Doomscrolling can affect an individual both mentally and physically. Maureen Salomon, an executive editor for Harvard’s Health Publishing, wrote in 2024 the article “Doomscrolling Dangers”, in which she details other physical secondary effects, “…Stomach-churning news has a tendency to turn our stomachs. But nausea is far from the only physical effect of doomscrolling. Others can include headaches, muscle tension, neck and shoulder pain, low appetite, difficulty sleeping, and even elevated blood pressure, according to Harvard experts.”. Additionally, Maureen highlights that this action promotes a sedentary lifestyle since there’s very little physical movement people can do while spending time on their phone (par. 12).

In addition, the list of psychological sequels is much complex and longer: compulsively scrolling is linked to depression, existential anxiety, low life satisfaction and bad mental health overall. A study made in 2023 by Benjamin Zablotsky, et al. shows that 50.4% of teenager had four or more hours of daily screen time (par. 2), and 27.1% of them had experienced anxiety symptoms recently, while 25.9% had experienced depression related symptoms (par. 9). In contrast, only 12.3% of teenagers with less than four hours of screentime had manifested anxiety symptoms, and 9.5% had depression signs recently.

According to Dr. Nerurkar, cited by Salamon (par 15.), prolonged social media exposure creates a phenomenon called ‘popcorn brain’, which Dr. Nerurkar defines as ‘the real, biological phenomenon of feeling your brain is popping because you're being overstimulated online. Then it's hard to engage with the real world, which moves at a much slower pace’.”. This phenomenon demonstrates the dopamine dysregulation people’s brains face after staring at a screen for a long time. Brains get used to the fast-paced environment and hollow dopamine production, making other activities seem boring and never as appealing.

Zoomers, or gen Z, born between 1995 and 2009, were raised in a digital era that significantly grew over the years (and still does). No other generation had experienced the internet like this before. Scientific evidence claims there is a chance that doomscrolling can greatly affect Zoomers in the near future after collectively receiving brain damage from the social media misuse, which could be dangerous if mixed with the current state of the world. To draw an example, news outlets, books, cinema or other entertainment media, and even social physical spaces have been replaced by phones: no other can compete with the dopamine production and quick satisfaction from social media stimuli. This can subsequently cause an increased collective cognitive decline caused by doomscrolling overtime. It could also affect most adolescents and young adults, and represent a social decline: “The interaction of internet literacy and addiction calls for educational interventions in the course of developing healthy digital habits in a way that could reduce cognitive impairments.” (Fahmy, Ahmed, et al. 4.3.4).

Covid-19 changed the world in many ways. As the population transition back to normality, the long-term effects of the social enclosure were forgotten, and people’s relationship with social media is one of them. Understanding how the phenomenon took over people’s lives can result helpful in the prevention of collective social issues and personal consequences caused by doomscrolling.