Surprised me too
leave me a comment below and tell me how
many hours a day you use your smartphone
so today we are going to understand the
science
that makes smart phones as addictive as
drugs and in the second part of the Article i will give you seven ideas of how you
can break this loop
and one bonus tip to take charge of your
own powerful brain
so let's get going..
Hey there this is Zakir Ayoub CEO of Zakir Ayoub's Study Portal. So what is it that makes smartphones as
addictive as drugs
let's beep into the human brain imagine
playing a game of Pubg or Free Fire and winning a chicken dinner at the end
of the match
this stimulus of pleasure causes your
brain to release
dopamine. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter
that is produced in the ventral
tegmental
area vta of the brain from the vta
it moves to four different areas of the
brain
the first is the amygdala, the amygdala
processes
emotions and we feel this happiness
or euphoria the second area this
dopamine travels to
is the hippocampus which is responsible
for the formation of memories
the hippocampus will remember that game
or the chat notification that made you
happy
and the next time you encounter it you
will click on it based on
previous experiences of pleasure now
this
action of clicking is controlled by the
third region in the pathway
the nucleus accumbens the nucleus
accumbens
is also called the brain's pleasure
center
this directs our motor actions and
prompts our fingers
to keep tapping and finally the dopamine
also reaches the prefrontal cortex, the prefrontal cortex
is that part of the brain towards the
front
that is larger in humans than in any
other animal
it powers our ability to sink plan
solve problems and make decisions this
area
is also responsible for our focus and in
response to the dopamine surge
it diverts all the attention from the
studies that we are supposed to do
towards the smartphone.
Now if dopamine
is making us happy
what's the problem the problem is that
dopamine puts your brain
into overdrive as a habit forms
the brain responds by toning down the
impact of dopamine
now you need more of your phone to get
that same pleasure
now excess dopamine also causes the
level of serotonin to drop. Serotonin is a hormone responsible for
satiety or contentment therefore the
more dopamine we
get the serotonin levels drop and we are
just not satisfied
we keep going back to our phone for more
and more which leads to
addiction before we move on to the
algorithm of our smartphone.
I would like to give a shout out to Wani Bushra who left this warm message on our
previous Article that got 89 likes from
you
so if you want a shout out in my next Article leave me a message below. The algorithm don't our
brains get bored of playing the same
game
over and over
these apps and games are very clever
they have
inbuilt techniques to generate novelty
like new levels of pubg or new video
recommendations on youtube
this starts the dopamine loop all over
again and it's called a compulsion loop
this by the way is the same loop
responsible for addiction to cocaine on
nicotine. Do you know in the last one year
there has been a 55 increase in social
media usage
and 45 increase in online gaming
i want you to share with me how you feel
about your phone
and why you are so unable to put it down?.
Digital escape room 93
people confess to using their phones to
avoid boredom
as against reading a book or engaging
with other people
and 47 millennials admitted
that they often use their smartphones
with the sole
intention of avoiding people around them
in fact
this behavior has led to some new
english words
like nomophobia no more
phobia which is the fear of being
without your cell phone
or anxiety which is the constant
illusion
that your phone is ringing and fabing
which is the practice
of ignoring the people in front of you
to keep checking
your mobile do you know any other
interesting new words like these
and drop them for me in the comment
below.
And now for the solutions
so how do we stop ourselves from falling
down this rabbit hole of mobile
addiction? Here are seven solutions to control your
device
before it starts controlling you from
real life
to real life.
The search for dopamine
outside our phones
scientists have found that one hour of
meditation
increases dopamine by 64
doing half an hour of yoga listening to
your favorite
songs and getting seven to nine hours of
sleep
also refuels your body's dopamine and
not only dopamine
these activities also release serotonin
so we feel
satisfied and truly happy.
So there are many ways to keep the
notifications on your phone off
try to disable notifications keep your
phone on DND or on zen mode or switch it off when
you're not using it
you could also uninstall addictive apps
like
instagram or facebook and use them from
your browser instead. I'll share a trick with you switch your
phone
from color to grayscale colored objects
activate the visual areas of the brain
these parts of the brain process color
and store
positive memories associated with bright
colors
like red and blue in contrast
black and white do not have any
refreshing memories associated with them
and will not keep our attention for long
the three
two one rule now imagine your productive
focused mind to be like this calm lake
and each notification is like a stone
dropping into the lake. Now if there are drops all around the
lake is disturbed
it can take a while before you get back
to that productive state of mind
so how about you check your personal
messages
only three times a day you use
recreational apps which are for videos,etc only twice a day and check your group
chats
only once a day make your phone a reward
for finishing your work
for example i will watch one full
episode of friends
only after i finish revising two
chapters
five minute challenge did you know that
an
average user checks their smartphone
about 120 times a day
most of the time we do this in between
two activities
for example the five minutes between
classes
now in these five minutes try alternate
activities
like meditation some stretches or even a
power nap
this will help you focus on your next
activity Buddha said the trouble is you think you
have time
one of the most difficult steps in
controlling our addiction
is to regulate the amount of time that
we spend on social
media how about you set a daily reminder
under your activity on instagram or
remind me to take a break under time
watched
on youtube start with one hour and
gradually reduce it to 45 minutes
30 minutes.
And so on my personal trick
is to become publicly accountable take a
sheet of paper
write down your target time and daily
usage
and stick this paper on your fridge
once you realize that all eyes are on
you
i tend to feel pressurized to stay
within the time limit
tuck your phone to bed away from you
this is the hardest one
i struggle to keep my phone in another
room when i go to sleep
but it's a must do also challenge
yourself to complete
five small tasks in the morning before
you look at your phone
once you get into the rhythm of the day
you will not spend a lot of time on the
phone yourself
out of sight out of mind.
Now for the
bonus tip
bonus tip is phone free living
you and your family can demarcate some
phone free
zones in the house like the dining table
or the balcony
phone free timings like the evenings or
lunch time
and maybe even phone free days like
family vacations
or sundays you can turn this into a game
whoever uses their phone
first will have a fun punishment and i
hope this Article helps you to be
phone free for a bit so stay happy and
happy learning
Did you find this post useful?
Getting Info...