Social Media Isn't Just Addictive — It's Addictive By Design

The more we activate that intense pleasure response on social media, Lembke says, the more we crave it. The repetitive action becomes less exciting and we end up needing more to give us the same pleasure we experienced with a lesser amount before. Harris likened social media to a slot machine — we don’t know if we’re going to have positive interact... See more

“The problem with things that release a lot of dopamine all at once is that our brains have to compensate. But this is really the key point — our brains don’t just then bring our dopamine firing back to baseline level,” she said. “It actually pushes dopamine levels below baseline. We go into a dopamine deficit state. That’s the way the brain restor... See more