On Wednesday, a Los Angeles jury found that Meta and Google are responsible for designing products that are deliberately addictive and for failing to warn users about the nature of their products.
This is great news, a historic verdict that will inform hundreds of cases to come. While the plaintiff, a 20-year-old identified only as KGM, was awarded $6 million in damages, it is the verdict itself that is the most damaging, opening the door to many more lawsuits against technology companies.
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KGM’s lawyers, in their closing comments, said: “How can you make a child never put down the phone? That’s called addiction engineering. They designed it, they put these features in the phones. These are Trojan horses: they look wonderful and cool… but you invite them in and they take control.”
Why is it so hard to put down our phones? Are social media and scrolling really as addictive as substances like nicotine and tobacco? Should we protect our children from technology, or is this a content issue that parents should control, rather than an app design issue? Below I will break down the scientific research behind the verdict.
While I think it’s pretty obvious to any phone user that social media apps have addictive qualities, there are additional concerns about the effects of heavy digital device use on children’s developing brains.
A literature review by Italian pediatricians linked digital addiction in children to depression, diet and psychological problems, as well as “sleep, addiction, anxiety, sex-related problems, behavioral problems, body image, physical activity, online grooming, vision, headache and dental care.” KGM was six years old when she first became addicted to social media, according to her testimony.
Researchers from Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands have also linked “high social media use” among adolescents to “a statistically significant change in the developmental trajectory of cerebellum volumes,” a part of the brain associated with emotional control. It could literally influence the physical development of the brain.
Another report says: “Frequent social media use may be associated with distinct changes in the developing brain in the amygdala (important for learning and emotional behavior) and the prefrontal cortex (important for impulse control, emotional regulation, and moderation of social behavior), and may increase sensitivity to social rewards and punishments.”
However, it is worth noting that none of these findings are yet conclusive.
Below are three ways Meta and Google could have designed their platforms to encourage addictive behaviors, backed by science and quotes from the essay.
1. The dopamine cycle
In a report from The Guardian, Meta employees in 2020 are quoted as saying “OMG, IG is a drug” in an email exchange, while a colleague responds: “Haha, I mean, all social media. We’re basically dealers.”
They are not entirely wrong. The basis of addiction has to do with the hijacking of the ‘mesolimbic system’, the part of the brain responsible for associating certain behaviors with rewards, both natural (food, sex, play) and artificial (drugs such as alcohol and nicotine, and notifications). Once a reward is achieved, dopamine is released.
A study on adolescent addiction linked activation of the mesolimbic pathway to social media use, stating that children are “often victims of a relentless ‘dopamine cycle’ created in a ‘craving’ loop induced by endless social media feeds, ‘seeking and anticipating rewards’ in the form of photo tags, likes and comments,” with the latter being the triggers that continue to reset the ‘craving’ behavior.
“Overactivation of the dopamine system in these individuals may further increase the risk of addictive behaviors or pathological changes leading to decreased pleasure from natural rewards.” Basically, all you want to do is keep scrolling, like an addict looking for an endless fix because natural rewards no longer provide the same pleasure as scrolling.
According to CNN, KGM attorney Mark Lanier said in his opening statement: “This case is about two of the richest corporations that have engineered addiction into children’s brains,” Lanier said in his opening statement. “The hit, for a girl, like Kaley, this move is that of a slot machine. But every time she does it, it’s not for money, it’s for mental stimulation.”
2. The infinite scroll
Now that swiping is a pleasure-creating tool, the next crucial tool in social media’s addiction-creating arsenal is infinite scrolling: the ability to swipe forever, to continue activating and hijacking the mesolimbic pathway for as long as the user desires. Likewise, auto-playing videos on platforms like YouTube and Netflix helps remove barriers and pauses, encouraging viewers to keep watching.
KGM lawyers cite infinitely scrolling feeds and video autoplay as features designed to keep people on apps, maintain attention, and encourage addictive behaviors. But that’s okay, because the inventor of the scrolling feed, Aza Raskin, apologized when he unleashed this horror on the world.
3. Algorithmically encouraged negative content
Have you ever heard of “happy scrolling”? Of course not. ‘Doomscrolling’, on the other hand, is called that for a reason. Negativity is more addictive than positive content: a 2024 report from the University of Cambridge said that “it has long been recognized that news-related social media posts that use negative language are reposted more, which in turn rewards users who create negative content through greater exposure.”
Combine this with the infinitely scrolling feed and the addictive, casino-style nature of social media platforms, and you get fatal scrolling, a constant stream of bad news, irritating user-created content, and messages that you’ll never be enough unless you do it. this, or buy that, or seem this.
KGM used Instagram filters on “almost all” of his photographs and “had not experienced the negative feelings associated with his body dysmorphia diagnosis before he began using social media and filters,” according to an Al Jazeera court report.
The same scientific report cited above on brain development also said that “in early adolescence, when identities and senses of self-worth are forming, brain development is especially susceptible to social pressures, peer opinions, and peer comparison.”
The final result? Children are easily impressionable, and if online negativity is more rewarding than positivity, unrestricted access to an endless stream of content designed to make users feel worse and increase engagement is going to warp their worldview. According to the jury, in this case the responsibility falls on the designers of the algorithm.
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