Is passive scrolling bad for you? What two new studies found

Is passive scrolling bad for you? Two studies covered this October point the same way: what you do on your phone seems to matter at least as much as how long you're on it. Young adults who spent four to five or more hours a day mostly consuming feeds and short videos scored worse than expected on memory and attention tests. People who mainly used their phones to message others did not, according to Semmelweis University.

That doesn't prove scrolling damages your brain, and the researchers say so themselves. It does give you a better target than the weekly screen time total that makes you wince and then changes nothing. Cut back on the feeds, keep the conversations, and silence most of the pings.

Heavy feed users scored worse on memory and attention

The study comes from Semmelweis University in Budapest. The paper itself appeared in Acta Psychologica in 2025, and a press release on 12 October 2026 is why it's in the news now. Participants were students aged 18 to 35 who answered questionnaires about phone use, mental and physical health, and cognition, then did cognitive and physical tests.

The researchers sorted people into three groups:

• Pure social: mostly using the phone to communicate.
• Light process: mixed use, under four to five hours a day.
• Heavy process: four to five or more hours a day, mostly consuming content. About a third of participants landed here.

The heavy process group did worse than expected for their age on memory and attention tasks. They also reported poorer sleep, a stronger need for constant stimulation and more trouble resisting the urge to check. The press release doesn't give a sample size, so hold the findings a little loosely until that detail is easier to confirm.

Self-control and FoMO mattered more than an anxious personality

One finding is quietly reassuring. Neuroticism, the tendency toward worry and anxiety, did not predict problem use on its own. Self-control and fear of missing out (FoMO) were the factors that did. As lead researcher Dr Johanna Takács put it, personality alone "does not make someone addicted to their phone."

That's useful, because self-control and FoMO respond to habits and setup. You can't swap your temperament, but you can move an app off your home screen.

One in three adults in Germany showed addiction-like phone use

If you filed this under teenager problems, a German project called KiQuNu suggests otherwise. It followed about 1,300 adults aged 18 to 65 using questionnaires plus an app that logged phone use for roughly two weeks, as reported by RTÉ and BR. Of the men, 32% showed problematic, addiction-like use, as did 29% of the women.

Average screen-on time was just under 4.5 hours a day, mostly in the evening. People received an average of 128 notifications a day, roughly one every 11 minutes, with more arriving between 6am and 6pm. About a fifth said phone use affects their concentration or health, most often as neck and back pain, poor concentration or memory problems.

There are two caveats worth keeping. The authors stress that "addiction" here means a high questionnaire score, and nobody was clinically diagnosed. A company planning a risk-score app, detoxi Health GmbH, was also involved, and no journal paper has appeared yet, so these figures haven't been through peer review.

Why a feed might affect you differently than a chat

Nobody has pinned down the mechanism. The intuitive version: a conversation moves at another person's pace, with natural gaps where you put the phone down. A feed keeps serving something new and never runs out, which fits the need for constant stimulation that the heavy users described.

Research on short video specifically is early. A 2026 preprint of 193 young adults found TikTok use was linked with inattention symptoms, while Reels, Shorts and Facebook Reels were not. It's small, cross-sectional and not yet peer reviewed, so read it as a hint that platforms may differ and nothing firmer.

The content point cuts the other way too. An eight-year Finnish study found children with more screen time showed slightly better cognitive performance as teenagers, and the researchers suggested the type of activity was what counted (ScienceDaily). Different age group, same lesson: hours alone tell you very little.

Is passive scrolling bad for you? Probably, with real caveats

Put together, the evidence leans one way, but it's thinner than the headlines make it sound. Keep these in mind before you blame your memory on Instagram.

• It's correlation. The Semmelweis release says the results "do not establish that scrolling directly causes" the cognitive differences. People with weaker attention might simply scroll more.
• The sample was narrow. Students aged 18 to 35 may not tell you much about a 50-year-old.
• "Addiction" is a score. In both studies it comes from questionnaires, which is handy for spotting patterns and useless for diagnosing you.
• Nobody tested cutting back. Neither study checked whether reducing feeds improves memory or attention.
• Doomscrolling research is young. A scoping review links it mainly with depression, anxiety and stress, but the body of work is still small.

Your neck cares more about the total hours

Here the pattern flips. In the Semmelweis study, total time was more closely tied to physical effects, especially forward head posture, or "text neck". The researchers think this may affect balance and reaction time, but that's their explanation rather than something they measured. Neck and back pain was also the top complaint among the German adults.

How to stop mindless scrolling and keep the useful parts

The Semmelweis researchers say taking phones away isn't the answer, and most of their advice is about reshaping use. Here's a version you can start today.

1. 01
   Look at the breakdown

   Open your per-app screen time and sort it into talking to people versus feeds and videos, because psychologist Julia Brailovskaia notes many people underestimate their use.

2. 02
   Silence most notifications

   Turn off alerts from social apps first and check messages in batches, since 128 pings a day means an interruption every 11 minutes.

3. 03
   Cap the browsing

   Set a daily limit on social feeds, one of the researchers' own recommendations, and leave messaging alone.

4. 04
   Add friction

   Move feed apps off your home screen and decide in advance when you'll check, which targets the FoMO and impulse control the study flagged.

5. 05
   Keep the phone out of bed

   Heavy content users reported worse sleep, and no phone before bed is on the researchers' list.

6. 06
   Raise the screen

   Hold the phone nearer eye level, take breaks and exercise to ease neck strain.