Between drafting a new short film script, outlining episodes for my podcast, and just trying to keep up with my friends, my brain usually feels like it’s completely fried by the end of the day. Naturally, I reach for my phone to decompress. But a quick check of an app almost always turns into an hour vanished into thin air.
I used to think this was just my own lack of willpower. But it turns out, we’re actually being played.
According to former Google Design Ethicist Tristan Harris, tech companies design our apps using the exact same psychological tricks as casinos and magicians. The most powerful one is the slot machine effect. Every time we pull down to refresh our email or swipe to see the next video, we’re playing a digital slot machine, hunting for an unpredictable reward. It’s no accident that we’re hooked; it’s all planned and meticulous.
Another major trick is the illusion of choice. Harris points out that tech companies architect the “menus” we pick from. We fiercely defend our right to make free choices, but we rarely ask why we are being given specific options in the first place. When we open our phones in the morning, the “menu” is a list of notifications framing the start of our day around everything we missed, rather than what we actually want to focus on.
They also rely on the “bottomless bowl” effect to keep us consuming. Think about YouTube automatically playing the next video after a countdown, or a social media feed that is never ending as you scroll. By eliminating natural stopping points, these platforms remove any reason for you to pause and reconsider if you actually want to keep looking at your screen.
We think we’re making conscious decisions about how we spend our downtime, but these platforms are actively built to ensure they win our attention every single time.
References:
Harris, T. (2016). How technology is hijacking your mind — from a magician and Google design ethicist . Medium . https://medium.com/thrive-global/how-technology-hijacks-peoples-minds-from-a-magician-and-google-s-design-ethicist-56d62ef5edf3
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