-Are you scrolling?
It's probably how you found this video.
How long you watch the video,
how many likes, comments, shares, influences what you see.
-Travel pillows?
We've been wearing them the wrong way.
-Shut up.
-Although what you do on social media
may seem insignificant to your overall wellbeing,
it does matter.
-You twist the seasoning bottle, not shake it.
-You twist it!
-Well, social media has essentially
taken human connection and turned it into a drug
by distilling it down to the essential properties
that make something addictive.
-For others, social media has been a place
where they found lost family members,
organ donors...
-So if you have a boat.
-...meaningful life events
that have happened around the world.
But cellphones and social media are so deeply connected
to every aspect of our lives... -TikTok taught me.
-...our work, family, school
that most experts say we can't easily quit.
♪♪
And to understand why social media is so addictive,
we have to look into how our brain works.
The brain controls thought, memory, emotion,
along with all the five senses
and every process that regulates our body.
All those tasks are performed by pathways
where the brain sends messages to the nervous system,
and the nervous system sends messages back.
We'll focus on the brain's reward system.
Here is where dopamine is mostly produced,
a type of neurotransmitter, also called a feel-good hormone.
That is sent to four pathways.
One of those is the mesolimbic dopamine pathway,
which is connected to the amygdala and the hippocampus.
The first processes emotion,
while the latter is essential for learning and memory.
Too much or too little dopamine affects how we learn,
get motivated, our mood, attention,
our heart rate, and many other behaviors
and physical functions. And this is where studies
show the addictiveness of social media.
-When we engage with social media,
it releases a lot of dopamine in the brain's reward pathway,
lights up the same part of the brain as drugs and alcohol.
It's incredibly accessible.
We have 24/7 access to this particular drug.
It's bountiful in the sense
that it's, practically speaking, infinite.
TikTok never runs out.
And number four, it's incredibly novel.
The AI algorithms learn what we've liked before
and actually push to us the suggestion that we want
to keep going or check out the next new new thing.
-In late May, the surgeon general put out an advisory
about the effects of social media on youth mental health.
He highlighted adolescence and childhood
as a critical stage in brain development
and that young people are more at risk
when they're spending too much time on social media.
-The bottom line is we don't have enough evidence
to say that this is, in fact, sufficiently safe for our kids.
What we have instead is growing evidence
that tells us that social media use
is often associated with harms to our kids.
And my growing concern is that social media
has become an important contributor
to that youth mental health crisis.
-But how do you explain this to teenagers?
18-year-old Mariana Myers tried to do just that.
She animated a visual essay named Nomophobia,
or "no mobile phobia," for her English class in Arizona
on what it looks when you're addicted to social media.
-The idea of the video was kind of a cautionary tale
as to saying how technology, smartphones in particular
and social media, can be great.
It can be a great tool, a way to connect,
but it can also lead to overuse,
and overuse can lead to a lot of negative consequences.
-Myers' video is now part of a lawsuit
in her home school district,
which is suing Meta, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube
for creating what they say
is a health crisis among America's youth.
Although similar lawsuits have been filed across the country,
like in California and Washington,
access to social media is everywhere.
Dr. Lembke says moderation is key.
She then recommends a dopamine fast
and to become aware of the three C's --
control, compulsion, and consequences.
-If we're using in an out-of-control way,
if we're using in an automatic, compulsive way
that we can't stop even when we want to,
and if we're having consequences as a result of our use,
we really have to take a hard look at that behavior,
try to make a change.
-Similar to what Miles Crawford and Charlene deGuzman
show in their short documentary, "I Forgot My Phone."