Some of the most notable signs that show that somebody is addicted to their phone include:
Compulsive checking
Losing track of time
Difficulty disengaging
Anxiety when disconnected from the online world
In everyday life, these signs often look like falling down a “rabbit hole” of short videos at 10 PM and suddenly realizing it’s 2 AM, or feeling that ghost buzz in your pocket when your phone isn’t even there. It’s that nagging urge to refresh your feed during a movie because the scene is slow, or feeling genuinely uneasy just because you left your device in the other room to charge.
One study conducted in a Chinese university found that only 25% of users self-report problematic behaviors, especially in short-video, gaming, and social networking apps. This highlights a very important issue where it gets even harder to ask for help once you are addicted to the digital realm because of the denial in addictive apps users. (2)
Some design features that heavily impact user behavior include:
An example of this is Snapchat’s snapstreaks, a feature that track progress of how often friends share messages and pictures. Once the snapscore has gone up significantly, it gets very hard to not miss Snapchat even a signle day as you have to start from scratch otherwise.
This is commonly seen in social media apps that allow users to give updates to others about their lives and share pictures. There is allways the feeling that somebody else is doing better than you simply because of a picture they posted in a while.
This iss like when somebody is gambling. For example on Instagram, the more likes you get by posting a story the more you are determined to post again to chase the same feeling that you have only just tasted a little.
Behavioral addiction manifests itself through some sort of halo effect. It all starts with incentives that are put in place by app designers to exploit the wiring of your brain (3). From then on, your brain prooduces a response in the form of constant and irresistible checking, which when unchecked then goes on for hours each day until you cannot help yourself but open that app every now and then.
Here are some practical steps that one can take on their own in order to fight PSU:
Turn off nonessential notifications.
Set screen-free zones or hours (nighttime, meals).
Use digital well-being tools to track time.
Remove apps that exploit streaks or fear-of-missing-out.
Practice intentional usage like scheduling check-in times.
Think of these steps as small ways to reclaim your attention. It might mean making the dinner table a strict “no-phone zone” so you can actually enjoy your meal, or muting that chaotic group chat that buzzes every three seconds. It could even be as brave as deleting an app that guilt-trips you for breaking a daily “streak,” or simply moving your charger to the hallway so your phone isn’t the last thing you see before you sleep.
These strategies can help mitigate the constant loops, as Alter describes, the “impulse to check” and the anxiety that is caused by always-on connectivity. (3)