In January, I noticed that I had been using social network apps on my phone wayyyy too much. They occupied my attention in class, at work, and even when going out on weekends. As many studies have shown, this is a very common issue these days, but I wanted to experience for myself what I would be like if I didn’t have these distractions all the time.
My main culprits were Twitter and Instagram so I chose them to be the accounts I would deactivate and delete. I considered Facebook, but it is tied up to many of my other online accounts like Spotify, etc. For those who asked, I told you that I was giving them up because they simply occupied too much of my time (definitely true), but it was mostly for my little experiment.
From the start of this experiment, I knew that social networks were an addiction because of how hard it was for me to get rid of them. Instagram was easy because once I deleted it, it was gone. Twitter on the other hand was a little more difficult. I reactivated my Twitter account twice before gaining the self discipline to not log on for the thirty days that it takes for your account to be deleted. (I’m sure they count on you coming back within that time to keep their users from going through with this.) Not only were they addictions, they were also habits. Almost every time I picked up my phone, I would intend to go to Twitter or Instagram for a split second before realizing that they were gone. I’d say that lasted about a good two to three weeks.
After I was free of these accounts, I did notice some differences. To begin, I found myself to be more engaged in the activities of my daily life. In class I paid attention more, at work I was distracted less, and in social settings I participated in conversations more rather than picking up my phone at the first awkward pause. Overall I was a lot more productive, for a while anyway.
Around the fourth week of this little experiment, I noticed that I was developing new habits. I was using Snapchat and Facebook a lot more. I rarely used Facebook before this experiment, only getting on when I had a notification of some sort and Snapchat was the same way. I replaced Instagram with Snapchat’s “My Story” feature and scrolled Facebook’s newsfeed in place of Twitter. Snapchat was and still isn’t much of a problem since there are only a few stories from my friends everyday so it only takes up thirty seconds here and there. I used Facebook as a place to find new things to make me laugh so it would sometimes take large chunks of time. I solved that problem by logging out of Facebook on my computers, tablets, and deleting the app on my other mobile devices. This actually worked quite well because whenever I would pull up Facebook, I was always too lazy to actually type in my account information. Who knew laziness could be so useful.
I went with this experiment for the full spring semester and almost the entire summer. I felt that this timeframe would allow me to see the differences between life relying on apps for entertainment and life without them during different periods. I think the experiment was worth it. I have become more productive and more social which were certainly areas I needed to work on. I also found that it was pretty enjoyable to have fewer notifications to suck me into my phone all the time.
For many people who read this, you will probably say that you already knew that these things were addictions or that you don’t have a problem with them. I say try giving them up for a week or so and see what happens. I am returning to both Instagram and Twitter because they are great ways to stay in the loop of things going on in my area, especially things going on at The University of Mississippi where I work and study. However, I will approach the apps a little differently this go round. I won’t have push notifications enabled from Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook. That will keep me from being pulled into the apps except when I want to and have time to use them. I will keep Snapchat notifications on since I tend to use Snapchat more like multimedia messaging quite frequently. Furthermore, I will be keeping an eye on my usage of these apps and if it becomes a problem, I will just delete them indefinitely after seeing that things are just fine without them.
Now that I’m coming back, I could use a few followers so feel free to follow me!
- Instagram/Twitter: @stephenmbenn
- Facebook: Stephen Benn
- Snapchat: smbenn
