Brain Rot: The Impact on Young Adult Mental Health

We’ve all experienced that foggy feeling after a late night and little sleep. It’s hard to focus. Productivity wanes. We can feel agitated, anxious, negative, even depressed. If drinking or drug use was involved the night before, we might feel even more lethargic and disoriented.

These days, many of us experience these feelings, even when we get enough rest and don’t drink too much. Endless hours in front of our phones and computer screens are causing digital information overload. The result is brain rot, which can have far-reaching effects on young adult mental health.

Key Takeaways

• Brain rot is a condition of mental fogginess, lethargy, reduced attention span, and cognitive decline that results from an overabundance of screen time.
• One brain rot behavior is doomscrolling, which involves long periods of searching for negative and distressing news online.
• Consequences of brain rot include difficulty organizing information, solving problems, making decisions, and recalling information.
• To prevent or reduce brain rot, try limiting screen time, deleting distracting apps from your phone, and turning off unnecessary notifications.

What Is Brain Rot?

Brain rot, sometimes written as one word, “brainrot,” is a state of mental fogginess and cognitive decline that results from excessive screen engagement. Is brainrot real? It’s not a medically recognized condition, but it is a real phenomenon.

When we spend hours surfing and scrolling, we consume huge quantities of meaningless data, negative news, and perfectly retouched photos of friends and celebrities that make us feel inadequate. Trying to absorb and cope with massive amounts of content creates mental fatigue. And that can lead to a drop in motivation, focus, productivity, and energy over time, especially in young people.

How Brain Rot Behavior Affects Young Adults’ Mental and Emotional Well-Being

On the surface, spending a lot of time on your smartphone or in front of a computer may seem harmless. Over the long term, however, brain rot behavior can damage your well-being mentally and emotionally.

Activities like doomscrolling affect the brain’s reward system. That’s because humans tend to prioritize and remember negative information more than positive. So landing on another distressing piece of news prompts the search for more disheartening information.

Doomscrolling can desensitize people to negative stimuli, making it harder for them to experience positive feelings or derive pleasure in other ways. One study showed that doomscrolling may lead to higher levels of psychological distress and lower levels of mental well-being. Another found that people who have high levels of negative news consumption also have poorer mental and even physical health.

The Impact of Brain Rot Behavior on Young Adults’ Cognition

Research has shown that the Internet can produce acute and sustained alterations in cognition related to attention and memory, which may be reflected in changes in the brain’s gray matter.

Repeated scrolling can have a negative effect on individuals’ mental faculties by disrupting the brain’s capacity to encode and retain information. As well, constant overstimulation can lead to a reduced attention span.

For example, according to a study of 1,051 young adults between 18 and 27 years old, social media addiction has a significant negative association with executive functioning skills such as planning, organization, problem-solving, decision-making, and working memory.

What Brain Rot Behavior Does to Young Adults’ Self-Concept

Self-concept is also affected by brain rot. As the number of social interactions that occur on social networking sites has exploded, the online world has become its own social universe, especially for young adults. How many “friends,” “followers,” or “likes” you have is visible for all to see, making it easy to fall prey to the comparison trap.

In addition, the bombardment of posts flaunting people’s professional successes, exotic vacations, blissful relationships, and picture-perfect bodies (often digitally manipulated with filters) can lead to negative self-talk. The brain becomes so cluttered by the constant overstimulation that it struggles to parse out truth from fiction. Self-worth can suffer, leading to heightened levels of stress, anxiety, and depression.

How to Prevent Brain Rot

Preventing brain rot requires that being intentional about your media consumption. Your mental health and emotional well-being are likely to improve when you control your screen engagement. Some of the best strategies include:

Set Limits on Screen Time

Start by tracking how much time you spend browsing, scrolling social media, watching videos, and gaming. You may be shocked to discover just how much time you invest in digital pursuits.

Next, set boundaries around the number of hours you sit in front of screens each day. Delete distracting apps from your phone. Turn off notifications for news and social media. And don’t consume content right before bed. As you limit your screen time, notice how you feel.

Curate Your Feeds

Protect your headspace by being mindful of what you consume. Don’t succumb to sensationalistic and negative news. Diversify your media sources so you maintain a more balanced world perspective. Furthermore, unfollow accounts that regularly generate angry or anxious feelings. Populate your feeds with positive content that uplifts and inspires you. 

Pursue Non-Digital Interests

There’s a huge world beyond your screen. Reacquaint yourself with it by digging into hobbies and activities you enjoy. Go camping. Listen to music. Play an instrument or learn one. Write in a journal. Volunteer for an organization you believe in. Exercise. Practice yoga or meditation. Structure time each day to do things that make you happy and calm.

Connect Offline with Positive People

Your first instinct may be to pick up your phone to connect with others. Instead, make an effort to socialize with people in the real world. Developing and nourishing authentic connections with supportive friends, family, and colleagues in person lowers stress and provides a deeper sense of belonging. One survey of 18- to 25-year-olds found that young adults had the lowest levels of depressive symptoms when they enjoyed more offline emotional support.

Strengthen Your Mind

If you’re concerned your mind could be turning to mush, challenge it. The mind is like a muscle. It grows with exertion. Rather than scrolling, learn a foreign language or a new technical skill. Study a philosophical concept that expands your worldview. Sharpen your mind with mathematical or word puzzles. Develop your writing ability or read about a period in history you know nothing about. Resist the urge to slide into comfort scrolling. Retrain your brain instead.

Do a Digital Detox

Limiting screen time is good, but unplugging completely gives non-stop thinking a rest. It also allows you to become more aware of your thoughts, perceptions, and habits. One study found that taking just seven days off social media significantly increased perceived mental well-being, as compared to seven days of social media use.

A digital detox can take different forms. Start by taking short breaks from technology, by unplugging for 15 minutes at a time. Gradually extend that time, or take more frequent breaks. Go out with friends and agree beforehand not to look at your phones the whole time. Work up to taking a day trip—and keep your phone off the whole time.

Get Support

If you sense that your brain rot has grown into a more serious problem, reach out for support. Don’t isolate behind a screen where you may develop a full-blown digital addiction. Enlist the services of a therapist or counselor who can help you face your issue, develop healthy habits, manage triggers, and set realistic goals.

Young Adult Treatment at Newport Institute

At Newport Institute, we recognize that it’s unrealistic to expect young adults to disengage from technology completely in their everyday lives. However, we also understand the risks of screen dependency and digital addiction. Our clinicians focus on the underlying factors that lead to problematic digital behaviors such as social anxiety, low self-esteem, trauma and PTSD, and loneliness and depression.

To help young people jump-start behavioral change, our tailored treatment plans include Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. Clients also participate in Adventure Therapy, Mixed Martial Arts, yoga, and creative arts therapies (depending on location. The goal is to build real-life, hands-on connections and engagement to replace virtual experiences.

Contact us today to schedule a free assessment and learn more about our nationwide young adult treatment locations.

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