Does social media cause ADHD?

Is there a correlation or just a coincidence between them?

From time to time, we hear about a supposed link between ADHD and social media. It's true that ADHD has been more discussed and treated in the last 20 years, coinciding with the rise of social media in our lives. But is there a direct link between the two?

Evidence suggests it's likely a big coincidence. Social media does not cause ADHD. Mental disorders are inherent to the individual from early life. However, correlations exist, and we need to be aware of them.

The Appeal of Social Media for ADHD

Social media makes interactions easy and instantaneous, appealing due to impulsivity and reward sensitivity. This creates an endless cycle of stimulus and dopamine release, which affects the unique chemistry of our brains.

In other words, we find ourselves binge-scrolling our favorite platform without wanting or needing to, far from staying conscious or focused on what we're doing. This mirrors one of the biggest issue ADHD brings: the inability to make conscious choices when a reward mechanism is at play.

Raising ADHD Awareness

Social media has a smart mechanism of appeal to everyone, not only people with ADHD. But our awareness needs to be taken to another level since we can easily fall into hours and hours of scrolling, leaving aside the abundance of needs and possibilities that lie outside the phone or computer.

Likewise, our behaviors associated with ADHD can certainly gain strength because it's very common for us to find real-world social interactions overly challenging, resulting in increased chances of facing social rejection at some point. Consequently, we might seek refuge in the digital world, where interactions are fast, impulsive, and superficial, with apparently fewer consequences for mistakes.

Balancing Social Media Use

This is not to say that platforms like Facebook, Threads, or Instagram are inherently bad or good for you. It's about your relationship with the resource. This is not a call to delete your account or declare war on the platforms. It's a call to use them constructively, with more consideration of their importance and the time we invest in them.

Social media can be a great resource. We can deepen knowledge, develop relationships, and even launch international alliances for people affected by ADHD, like this community here.

It may sound curious that I'm writing this since you probably know this community through my posts on Threads. I’ll be forever grateful for that. It changed my life for the better, and I hope it’s making a positive difference for you too. But gratitude doesn't mean we should be naive:

It’s important to take into account that every social media platform operates under algorithms designed to engage us by delivering content that maximizes the time we remain connected. Their business is traffic. The longer we stay connected, the better for them.

So it’s our job to control our traffic on them, because they won’t make it for us.

Strategies for Healthy Social Media Use

What can we do to benefit from social media without falling into its traps? Strategies are personal, but here’s what I do:

First, I deleted all social media apps from my phone. If you spend most of your day on a computer, you can use them on a big screen. This makes the user experience less attractive, curbing unconscious scrolling, and preventing that you use them during your long waited free time.

Another strategy is to set a countdown alarm whenever you open a platform. It may seem odd initially, but after a few days, you may internalize it and then it becomes routine. I set a timer on my smartwatch for 5 minutes when I "go social." Sometimes I allow 10 minutes. When the alarm vibrates, it’s a sign to switch activities.

Of course, this method is not a guarantee of control since it's simply a matter of ignoring the bell to hang on. But it's a compromise I make with myself. Even considering that I'm not able to follow it every single time, I can estimate that at least a third of the time, I successfully adhered to my self-imposed limit. In another third, exceeding my boundaries made me feel bad about this action, thus reducing my overtime.

Conclusion

In conclusion, while ADHD diagnoses and social media usage have both increased in the last two decades, the relationship between them is complex. Correlation doesn’t imply causation. Despite potential traps for those of us with ADHD, we can manage our relationship with social media to benefit from it while taking good care of our health!