Dopamine Addiction is Now the Most Common Problem for Teens

The Anxious Generation, by Jonathan Haidt, released in 2024 has laid out a terrifying world for teens today. Major Depression rates are up 135% for teenage girls and 161% for Teenage boys since 2010. Anxiety rates are up 171% for undergraduate students. ADHD is up 60-70%. But when you talk to anyone with a teen, none of them are even remotely surprised. They’ll quickly point to screens as the problem… and they are right.

What is behind this epidemic for the next generation?

To answer that, we need to turn to brain science and learn about Dopamine.

What is Dopamine?

Dopamine is a neurotransmitter in the brain that helps us automate repetitive tasks and form habits. It tells us when something feels good. It is released all the time in normal, healthy ways like when we eat food that tastes good, receive a compliment, watch something funny or entertaining, and many other positive interactions. It is involved in far more than we realize and impacts behavior and physical functions, such as:

• Learning
• Motivation
• Kidney function
• Lactation
• Sleep
• Memory and focus
• Stress response
• Mood
• Attention
• Digestion and blood flow
• Pain processing
• Heart rate
• Blood vessel function
• Control of nausea and vomiting
• Movement

What does dopamine do in relation to screens? 

The brain uses dopamine to remember that interactions are enjoyable and motivates us to do those things again in the future. It also releases dopamine to push us towards certain actions that are likely to release dopamine for us like a video game or scrolling on our phone. In fact, after the brain learns something is enjoyable, more dopamine releases in the anticipation of something than actually experiencing it.

Let’s take an example like waiting in line at a drive-through. 

A healthy dopamine curve, seen in Figure 1.1, starts at a baseline level of dopamine. A cue or trigger like the little bit of boredom in the car waiting for food tells the brain to release dopamine to remove that boredom. The dopamine motivates us to pull out our phone seeking a way to kill the time, which is more enjoyable than sitting and doing nothing. Then, we find a video, post, or something interesting, giving us a hit of dopamine—though it’s less than the surge that initially compelled us to grab our phone. Our turn at the drive-through window gets us our food and we drive off letting our dopamine settle back down to a base level. 

Figure 1.1

This holds true in many areas of our lives. 

Think about planning a vacation. There is so much enjoyment that goes into thinking of a whole trip of fun. When you actually go on the trip, it is fun, but the anticipation outweighs the reality. The only exception to this is when something unexpected and amazing happens on the trip and new dopamine that your brain hasn’t already experienced is released. 

In both those examples, our brain knows when to return to normal. We are full from our meal, or the vacation ends. How do we know when to stop using screentime and enjoying the dopamine that comes from videos, news, or video games? There is always another post, article, or round. So,  we go on a dopamine high. See Figure 1.2. 

On that dopamine high, we can ride a roller coaster of one dopamine hit after another as we scroll through an endless stream of content or the next video or game auto-plays. When do we get off the roller coaster? There is no cue telling our brain that it is time to stop like our stomachs tell us to stop eating. 

Figure 1.2 

Getting off the Dopamine Roller Coaster

For most children, they don’t ever learn how to get themselves off the roller coaster. Mom or dad, or someone else must tell them to stop. 

We did an event at an elementary school and asked the children how they know when it’s time to get off youtube or a video game. They answered “When my head hurts”, “When my eyes hurt“, or “When mom or dad tells me to.” 

Adults don’t have a trigger to get off the dopamine coaster either and so we have to consciously decide to get off. This is particularly difficult because as we covered earlier, our brains are releasing dopamine motivating us to keep searching out entertaining videos, posts, or games. 

We have to create new triggers in our brains to cue ourselves to put down our phones and take a break. If we’re being honest, most of us aren’t great at this and it’s usually external triggers like an alarm, our child asking us a question, or our spouse making a snarky comment about our screen time that cues us to get off of the ride. 

Chasing the Dragon

The longer and more often we ride the dopamine roller coaster, we become dulled by its ups and downs, and we need more stimulating videos, games, or other activities to release the same amount of dopamine that we got last time. This can lead us down some very dangerous paths. 

First, it can lead us down the path toward addiction. 

The phrase “chasing the dragon” is a phrase in drug culture that refers to always chasing after the high you got the first time you used a drug. Dopamine fires at 5-10x the normal rate when someone uses heroin or cocaine. Like we learned though, it spikes the highest that very first time, and then the brain remembers and releases dopamine in anticipation of using the drugs the next time. 

With screens, we can become so conditioned to seek out dopamine from increased screen time, that it takes more and more screen time to give us the feel-good hormones that we got when we first scrolled Instagram or played our favorite video game. 

Second, if you stay on the roller coaster too long, you always crash. 

Anyone with a child, who’s asked them to get off their video game or device and had that child blow up on them has seen a dopamine crash. 

Our brains are getting high hits of dopamine, one after another, and when we finally stop scrolling (or playing) we feel gross. Our brains are exhausted and the normal day-to-day is no longer motivating. 

It can take 15-20 minutes for our brains and bodies to regulate and get through a dopamine crash. But much longer if we train our brains to thrive on it habitually. 

Lastly, the dopamine roller coaster can dull the enjoyment of the rest of life. 

If our brains are receiving consistent dopamine highs, they are being trained to expect those highs and they will stop releasing dopamine for lower dopamine-producing activities. This includes activities like eating dinner, engaging family in conversation, or the good feeling that comes after we complete our homework. 

According to Stanford neuroscience research, the re-wiring affecting our brains extends far past the dopamine crash and looks like a new lower baseline level of dopamine in the brain.

Let’s take another look at that dopamine roller coaster but let’s show what it looks like to scroll TikTok for an hour. See Figure 1.3. 

Figure 1.3

We see this most pronounced in adolescents. We’ve worked with middle schoolers who have trained their brains to lower their active level of dopamine for any activity except their screens, their drug of choice. These children have no desire to get out of bed, go to school, or do anything but go to their device. 

This is addiction. 

It doesn’t just take 15-20 minutes to reset out of this, it takes weeks. Professionals would recommend up to 60 days to detox from whatever is causing addiction, replace it with alternate activities, and connect with other people struggling with something similar. Only after 60 days can we consider reintroducing a device, with strict boundaries – if at all. 

Awareness is the Start

As we think about how much screen time we allow our kids, what ages to get them certain devices, and how to help them grow into successful adults, we must also thoughtfully consider technology’s ability to addict our children. 

Video game addiction only became a WHO recognized condition in 2018. Recent studies have shown 8.5% of 8-18 year olds are addicted to video games. According to recent data, 50% of 18-22 year olds self report as being addicted to social media. 

This is a massive problem and we are just beginning to see the effects of it.

Compared to the dangers of alcohol, 10% of the US population have Alcohol Use Disorder, but only 2.3% of youths 12-18 have it. This is because as parents and as a society we protect children from alcohol. Children and adolescents are dramatically more likely to get addicted because of the stage of brain development they are in. 90% of substance addicts start using before they are 18. 

Sources:

American Academy of Pediatrics: https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article-abstract/127/2/e319/65247/Pathological-Video-Game-Use-Among-Youths-A-Two

Common Sense Media: https://www.commonsensemedia.org/press-releases/new-report-finds-teens-feel-addicted-to-their-phones-causing-tension-at-home

National Institute of Health: https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohols-effects-health/alcohol-topics/alcohol-facts-and-statistics/alcohol-use-disorder-aud-united-states-age-groups-and-demographic-characteristics

What To Do About It?

It’s our hope that by reading this article you will never look at screen time the same way. You will understand that excessive screen time will come with side effects. 

If you are a parent with young children, get out ahead of this issue. Ensure you are carefully monitoring what new tech comes into your home and watching how your children are engaging. 

If you are helping a child or a friend with tech addiction, here is the game plan we at Selfctrl have worked on with marriage and family therapists and an addiction specialist: 

• Get them through the denial stage – A child who doesn’t see anything wrong with their behavior is extremely unlikely to change. If they can see the problem and voice it themselves, you can start working on the next steps.
• Get specific on what the problem is – All screen time is not created equal. An hour of TikTok or YouTube right before bed is a lot more dangerous than an hour of Minecraft on a weekend morning. Have the person you are trying to help articulate the problem.
• Help them understand that we are powerless to stop addiction on our own – If they could stop it they would. That means they need help from another person. 
• Remove Access to the Addictive Activity – Recommended periods for detox are 3 weeks to 60 days before reintroducing the addictive activity, if at all. 
• Identify replacement activities – Review what they like about the video game, social media, or other tech-based activity and work with them to identify new healthy behaviors. 
• Guide them towards support – A school counselor, an addiction support group like CR for teenagers, a trusted friend to mentor them, or you. 
• Stay the course and Expect it to be difficult. Expect setbacks. Patiently lead them towards self-control around the addictive behavior. 

It’s starts with us

If you are reading this and thinking of your own tech use, everything above applies to an individual. Seek out help from a friend, family member, therapist, church member, or wherever you have a community that will support you.  Keep reading, learning, and engaging with us to equip yourself in building more self-control around technology.

If you found this post helpful, join our mission and help us spread the word! Comment below or share this article with someone you love.