With smartphones all-pervasive, scrolling mindlessly has become an ingrained behaviour in many people’s daily lives. Fuelled by the constant influx of information and social media platforms, individuals often find themselves endlessly scrolling through content without a specific purpose or engagement.
To understand the psychosocial factors associated with this habit, a team of researchers from NIMHANS conducted a review of literature related to “mindless scrolling syndrome”. The team led by Manoj Kumar Sharma, Professor at the Department of Clinical Psychology, who also heads SHUT Clinic at NIMHANS, has analysed that the scrolling syndrome can disturb the quality of cognitive processing, reduce productivity, and impair attention.
The review article titled “Scrolling Mindlessly: Emerging Mental Health Implications of Social Networking Sites” has been published in the Journal of Public Health and Primary Care. Dr. Sharma, who is the corresponding author of the article, told The Hindu that this habitual behaviour could lead to decreased productivity, increased stress, and a sense of detachment from the present moment as attention gets divided among countless digital distractions.
