By Abby Knox, Staff Writer
Every morning since 2014, when I wake up, I grab my phone and find myself scrolling on TikTok. Before TikTok, it was Musical.ly, before Musical.ly, it was Dubsmash.
Immediate gratification media has been around for over a decade. These short videos constantly stimulate viewers’ brains, bringing them the dopamine and instant gratification they are looking for. Once the viewer is satisfied, they scroll onto the next short clip.
The vicious cycle repeats itself until you find yourself doom scrolling for hours on end when you only feel like you’ve been scrolling for a few short minutes.
I did not realize just how much I depended on TikTok for entertainment until the dreaded shutdown of TikTok on Jan 18.
Now let me say. Yes, I was one of the people who stupidly deleted the app thinking that it would never come back. But when it came back online less than 24 hours after being shut down, my friends were once again able to scroll while I, however, was not. Sadly, although the app was back online, it was not in the App Store. So I was unable to redownload it, and left feeling a bit upset that I had deleted the app.
It was not until a few days after deleting the app that I realized TikTok still was on my iPad, but it was quite inconvenient to pull out my iPad in between classes or when I was waiting in line at the cafeteria for a quesadilla. So, I usually only watched TikTok on my iPad before heading to bed.
After the initial annoyance, I began to realize how much time I spent daily on TikTok and how much I had been letting this app control me. Without TikTok to watch, I enjoyed spending less time on my phone, and instead of scrolling, I would listen to music or find something else to do.
I felt like I spent less time procrastinating my homework because I was not able to scroll on TikTok and instead just tried to get all my work done. TikTok began to feel like a luxury or reward after going to school and work. At the end of a long day, I was finally able to climb into bed and spend some time watching TikTok on my iPad before heading to sleep.
The short attention span that I and many others have acquired through extensive usage of TikTok over the years is no joke. It was not until TikTok was completely unavailable to me that I realized just how much it was affecting me.
TikTok has recently become available in the App Store again after being unavailable for nearly a month. Yes, I have redownloaded it on my phone. However, I feel like I am still spending less time on my phone and specifically on TikTok than before the shutdown. Maybe you should give it a shot: Delete it from your phone or set an app limit. See if you notice a difference in yourself.