Apr 21, 2025 08:00:00

How TikTok creates behavioral and social addictions for teens: 'I know it's poison, but I still drink it'

In the United States, the short video sharing app

TikTok is being regulated due to its potential negative impact on children. ByteDance, the developer of TikTok, is also investigating the serious impact TikTok has on children, and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has summarized the magical power of TikTok from existing internal reports that have been made public.

TikTok Is Harming Children at an Industrial Scale
https://www.afterbabel.com/p/industrial-scale-harm-tiktok

The District of Columbia and 13 states are suing TikTok, alleging that the company knowingly created an addictive product to hook kids on 'digital nicotine.'

Multiple states accuse TikTok of using 'digital nicotine' to prey on teens - GIGAZINE

The lawsuit includes direct testimony from TikTok employees and executives, which Haidt said show the company 'recognizes the harm it is causing.'

One of TikTok's most widely reported harms is its ability to hook young people for hours on end . TikTok's algorithm is widely regarded as the best at keeping users scrolling.

According to a report published by the Pew Research Center in 2024, 33% of American teenagers (ages 13-17) said they use social media platforms 'almost always,' and 16% said they 'only use TikTok.' Since the number of American teenagers (ages 13-17) is estimated to be about 21.8 million in 2023, this means that about 3.4 million American teenagers use TikTok almost constantly.

Survey results show that half of young people in the United States are 'almost always online' - what social media and platforms do young people use? - GIGAZINE

TikTok executives and employees acknowledge that they are targeting young Americans, saying, 'Young people, especially American teenagers, are better early adopters. Why? Because they have a lot of time on their hands.' 'American teenagers are the perfect audience. If you look at China, you'll see that there is no teen culture. Teenagers are so busy studying for exams at school that they don't have the time or the luxury of playing on social media apps.'

The company's executives also acknowledge that TikTok is having a negative impact on the mental health of millions of American children and young people, saying, 'compulsive use is built into the product itself.' 'Kids are watching TikTok because the algorithms are really good,' they said. 'But I think we need to be aware of how that impacts other opportunities.'

In a 2021 internal TikTok presentation, the company said, 'TikTok has reached saturation point among the 29.7 million American users under the age of 17 who own smartphones. This means that while TikTok can't attract more young users, it can make better use of each user's time by drawing them away from competing platforms.'

'As expected, younger users perform better across most engagement metrics,' wrote an internal TikTok document from 2019 outlining usage by age group. TikTank, an internal TikTok group that investigates issues affecting TikTok, noted that 'TikTok is especially popular with younger users who are particularly sensitive to reinforcement in the form of social rewards and who have little ability for effective self-regulation.'

Furthermore, TikTok's internal guide explains that app push notifications 'are intended to activate and engage users by providing them with the right content at the right time, increasing the number of times they open the app and increasing the time they stay in the app.' In fact, TikTok uses a variety of push notifications, such as TikTok's 'Interest Push,' which is intended to 'activate users and encourage them to return to the app.'

TikTok has also internally acknowledged that

TikTok LIVE poses 'cruel' risks to minors (encouraging addiction and impulse purchases of virtual items, leading to financial harm, and exposing minors to developmental risks) yet continues to use manipulative features to increase the time and money users spend on the app.

TikTok's phenomenal advertising success is due to the fact that users are 'more fully engaged and immersed in TikTok than on other platforms.' TikTok cited its 'algorithm and shorter video format that creates a continuous cycle of engagement' as making it 'the leading platform in information density.'

TikTok also attributes its success to a 'product experience that utilizes many coercive design tactics,' including 'strong personalization and automation that limits user agency,' 'numerous features that could be perceived as manipulative,' such as infinite scrolling, autoplay, constant notifications, and the 'slot machine effect.'

Additionally, an internal report reviewed academic literature on the impact of social media on youth and found that 'TikTok is particularly popular with younger users who may be more vulnerable to online harm and the negative effects of compulsive use.'

An internal report based on interviews with TikTok users also found that excessive use of TikTok caused users' 'negative emotions' and led to 'negative impacts on life,' including 'interfering with commitments and productivity' and 'lack of sleep, missed deadlines, poor academic performance, lateness, etc.' The report also noted that 'many participants stated that their TikTok use interfered with their sleep and limited their productivity and performance the next day,' and that 'all participants stated that time management on TikTok was particularly difficult compared to other social media platforms.'

In a report written before she became an executive at TikTok, Alexandra Evans reported on the negative impact TikTok has on young people, saying, 'Its persuasive design strategies exploit our natural desire to be sociable and popular, and our fears of not being sociable and popular, to prolong our online usage. For young people, their identity requires constant attention, curation, and renewal. Peer acceptance is a critical component at a critical stage of their development.'

'Providing content that perpetuates narrow beauty norms can have a negative impact on the well-being of our community,' TikTok's digital well-being research report states.

TikTank also noted that 'compulsive use is correlated with many negative mental health outcomes, including impaired analytical skills, memory formation, contextual thinking, conversational depth, empathy, and increased anxiety.' 'Compulsive use can also interfere with important personal responsibilities, like getting enough sleep, work or school responsibilities, and connecting with loved ones.'

One TikTok employee reported that 'there are a lot of videos that mention suicide,' including many that ask, 'If you could kill yourself without hurting anyone, would you do it?'

TikTok has a thorough content review process, but does not publish a 'leak rate' that indicates the percentage of violating content that is not moderated or removed. TikTok internally tracks the percentage of content leaked by type from its moderation process, and it has been revealed that this includes 35.71% 'normalizing pedophilia' content, 33.33% 'sexual solicitation of minors' content, 39.13% 'physical abuse of minors' content, 30.36% 'incitement to minors to leave the platform', 50% 'glorification of sexual assault against minors' content, and 100% 'fetishism of minors' content.

TikTok itself acknowledges that sexual exploitation and illegal activity on TikTok LIVE is 'controversial' and that TikTok's monetization scheme makes this even worse. TikTok acknowledges that 'sexually suggestive live content is on the rise,' but refuses to warn consumers about these dangers. Instead, TikTok plans to 'increase revenue through monetization channels such as gifting and subscriptions.'

Many teenagers realize the harmfulness of TikTok and complain about its addictive and negative effects, so why can't they quit TikTok? When Haidt asked the same question to heavy TikTok users at New York University, most of them responded with, 'I tried to quit, but I can't,' or 'I can't quit because if I quit, I won't understand what everyone is saying.'

In other words, TikTok is both a behavioral and social addiction, Haidt points out. Gen Z poet Cori James has said of social media, 'Even though I know it's poison, I still drink it.'

A recent study led by University of Chicago economist Leonard Burshtein recruited more than 1,000 college students and asked them, 'How much would you have to pay to make a contract not to use your Instagram or TikTok account for four weeks?' In response to this question, students asked for an average of 7,100 yen (8,400 yen for TikTok and 6,700 yen for Instagram). Next, the students were asked, 'If most other people stop using TikTok or Instagram, how much money would you have to make a contract not to use them?' The answer to this question was '0 yen.'

To further validate and expand on Burshtein's findings, Haidt conducted a national survey of 1,006 Gen Z (ages 18-27) young people. The survey asked people about various platforms and products they wish had never been invented. The survey revealed that relatively few people (less than 20%) wished they had never been invented Netflix or YouTube. The platforms that young people particularly wish had never been invented were Instagram (34%), Facebook (37%), Snapchat (43%), TikTok (47%), and X/Twitter (50%).

No consumer product is 100% safe. Even if one or two children die each year from accidental exposure, the product will never go away. But TikTok's harms are not limited to accidental exposure, but are a common consequence of ordinary use of the app for many young people, including children under the age of 13. TikTok is harming millions of children in the United States and around the world. This is industrial-scale harm, and 'TikTok should be unavailable to American children,' Haidt wrote.