Doomscrolling habits giving lasting brain rot effects
Anyone who loves whiling away the hours surfing the internet, scrolling through social media or playing computer games on their mobile phones and tablets needs to pause and take serious note.
So worrying is the increasing prevalence of this habit, it has been given a name: digital dementia.
Instead of providing entertainment, or even a way to simply pass the time, there now seems to be proof that screen time is making people less intelligent.
Recent scientific evidence has shown that excessive screen use is shrinking brains in the same way as seen in early-onset dementia and Alzheimer's patients. Nine
As Adam Hegarty reports, the evidence is frightening, especially when it comes to teenagers' use of smartphones and other devices.
Medical scans show significant shrinking of their brains, similar to what researchers find in elderly people with Alzheimer's disease.
Internationally renowned cognitive neuroscientist Dr Mark Williams says the scourge of digital dementia is a largely unrecognised health crisis.
Dr Williams says scans mimic something normally only found in the elderly.
Teenagers and young adults around the world are starting to recognise the long-term effects of screen usage. Nine
"The symptoms that we're actually seeing with the younger kids is very similar to what you'd see with someone who was getting dementia," he says.
"So it's not hard to correlate those two things and say, 'Hang on, we sort of need to do something different here."
Teenagers revealed serious changes in their behaviour due to screens.
Obsessive use of smartphones and other technologies is causing permanent damage in young people's brains. Nine
"You kind of find yourself rotting away day-to-day," Lucy Jackson said.
"You almost forget who you are," Max Stove told 60 Minutes.
Watch the full episode of 60 Minutes on 9Now.
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