Brain Rot

Understanding Digital Distraction

It took 22 million years for humans to develop their brains in order to think more wisely and respond to their environment for survival. And guess what? Within just a decade, with the remarkable development of social media platforms, humans have succeeded in reversing the above process to get closer to their ancestors from millions of years ago.

Sounds stupid, right? And that is exactly what’s happening with this generation: We call it “brainrot.”

Brain rot in a serious way is used to describe the dulling or deterioration of cognition and thinking caused by consuming too much online content, or what is so-called “quick content”, particularly among young people.

Art by Leo Decklar

Imagine comparing fast food and traditional healthy food: – which one is more appetizing? Most people are gonna choose (or say they would choose) the healthier one, but is that the truth happening in our daily lives? I don’t think so. 

You may ask, why in the world is the word “brain rot” a thing? And is it that big of a deal? The answer is yes and no at the same time. Yes, it truly is a thing right now; in fact it is way more “popular” in this generation than you might expect. Those “Rizz rizz, Sigma, Skibidi, Hey chat, Gyat,…” are now the “standard” in a normal conversation of Gen Zers. It might sound stupid (it is), but the content is considered funny according to most of them.

On the flip side, brain rot and all the weird stuff it brings are really just side effects of a much bigger problem that pretty much everyone’s stuck in, but barely notices.

Yep, I’m talking about the good ol’ doomscrolling effect.

The first issue to mention is the decline in attention and concentration abilities caused by the daily and hourly intake of quick content from social media platforms such as TikTok, Facebook (Meta), and Instagram. This severely impacts both user’s habits and awareness (not to mention that such information may also carry hostile, violent, anti-religious, and racist messages).

According to recent measures (https://news.gallup.com/poll/512576/teens-spend-average-hours-social-media-per-day.aspx), 51% of teenagers spent an average of 4.8 hours per day just scrolling through social media, by autumn 2023. As a result of this habit, by 2022 as many as 7 million young people (11.4%) in the U.S. were reported to be coping with ADHD, or Attention-Deficit/ Hyperactivity Disroder (https://www.cdc.gov/adhd/data/index.html). 

That leads to the second problem, which I call the “Cocktail of Dopamine.” The reason I use that name is based on the fact we constantly scrolling through a flood of fast, meaningless content – sprinkled here and there with a few genuinely funny or interesting posts – which basically rots our brains over time. The endless stream of dopamine hits from mindless scrolling slowly numbs us out.

And guess what? The algorithms are really smart. Sometimes, they know what we like and what excites us even better than we do, and so, guess what again? Brain rot content is now one of the most popular and “beloved” types of content out there. Don’t believe me? Open your TikTok up and just watch. And yes, I’m gonna skip the prime example of the “Skibidi Toilet” video series, so don’t mention it. And still, most of us can’t get out of it, right?

Take a step back and think for a second. Are you feeling the same way, too?

In short, brain rot itself isn’t really the thing we should be too worried about. What truly matters is our own habits and self-discipline. At the end of the day, every action and decision truly comes from each of us. So get off your butt, put that phone away, and start focusing on bettering yourself. Once you do that, everything else will probably start falling into place… hopefully. Here’s wishing you a day with less doomscrolling!

“Anyway, see ya soon, chat.”