WASHINGTON: Anyone who has been accused of having 'TikTok brain' and taken offence should stop reading now, if they haven't already done so.
If any would-be TikTok brain has the attention span to make it this far, he or she is about to read about research showing that incessant flicking through video clips on social media does indeed come at a price: "cognitive deficits."
According to scientists at Tianjin Normal University and UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles), people with what they call "short video addiction" not only show "compulsive and uncontrolled use of short video platforms," they also appear to be developing a different brain morphology or structure compared to others.
People with this addiction tend to "excessively consume personalised content to the extent that it negatively interferes with other activities," the team said.
After carrying out brain scans on 112 people aged between 17 and 30, the researchers said they found "cognitive deficits" in attention spans, learning and memory, as well as depression and anxiety.
TikTok brain, sometimes called brain rot, is typically linked to lengthy sessions on apps specialising in short video clips, be that established platforms such as TikTok and Snapchat or Instagram, Facebook and X which followed suit with similar video feeds.
"Short video addiction has emerged as a growing behavioural and social issue, driven by the widespread use of digital platforms that provide highly engaging, personalied and brief video content," the researchers said in a paper published by science journal NeuroImage. – dpa
