Social Media Detox! Will it help improve your focus? Grades?
January 10, 2020
Have we become slaves to our own creation? Technology was created to serve us, improve us and our lives but it seems that it has taken over our lives instead. We are addicted to social media and it is abusing our dopamine systems.
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that transmits signals between nerve cells of the brain. One of the most common roles of dopamine is in learning rewards. Something good happened? Dopamine is released. It’s responsible for instant gratification, incomplete gratification, unpredictable stimuli and anticipation and conditioning. All of this results in distractions and shifts of focus.
How about starting a detox and get your focus back? Starting is easy; sticking with it is hard. Start by deactivating your accounts, uninstall all social media apps, block social media sites. If deactivating accounts is too drastic, just delete your apps. Finding another activity to replace social media will help with filling in the “free” time.
Detox should be as little as 30 days and as much as 6 months. Dopamine levels on average take 3 months or 100 days to go back to normal. Should you decide to challenge yourself to do this for this semester let us know about your journey – email Q here.