A behavior that I’d like to change is my use of distracting apps on the weekends. I chose to define “distracting apps” as apps that I find it hard to stop using, or that prevent me from effectively accomplishing my tasks. This includes Instagram, YouTube and X.
I tracked my behavior over three days, from Friday, January 10 until Sunday, January 12. Inspired by the first Measuring Me assignment, I was interested in tracking my habits at a regular interval. I found the every 15 minute tracking to be helpful, but a lot to keep track of throughout a day. Rather, I decided to track my behavior every hour, on the hour, tracking app use using Apple’s ScreenTime feature.
On Friday, January 10, I woke up later, around 10 AM due to being out the previous night. I tracked my behavior throughout the day, until I slept at around 12 AM. That day, I logged 3 hours and 42 minutes, largely driven by use of X to track the fires that were impacting my hometown of Los Angeles.
On Saturday, January 11, I woke up at around 9 AM. Unfortunately, I forgot to track my social media use until about 4 PM that day, but I was thankfully still able to track my use of distracting apps via ScreenTime. As a result, I used these apps more frequently because I forgot about the tracking activity for class. I logged 5 hours and 1 minute that day.
On Sunday, January 12, I was determined to cut back on distracting apps due to my excessive use the previous day. I deleted Instagram, which I have done before when trying to reduce use of the app, and only tracked my use of X and YouTube. As a result, I was able to greatly reduce my screen time to 1 hour and 58 minutes. I also believe that the urgency of the assignments due in the upcoming week reduced my app usage.
Above, I created a connection circle that includes the different factors that influence the use of distracting apps on my phone. The green lines represent positive factors that lead to reduction in screen time, and the red lines represent negative factors that lead to increased screen time and/or procrastination. From this model, I realized that morning usage of social media, specifically upon waking, was a problem. If I started my days with a workout or dining hall brunch, I found that the discipline that required me to stay off of my phone carried throughout the day.
I also created a feedback loop that shows the cycle of distracting app usage. Starting when I opened my phone, I typically scrolled through the distracting apps, with an initial level of interest. However, I would eventually get bored, and then I would take one of two paths. I would either return to my work, and then return to my phone much later, or I would get bored, feel bad about myself, and continue scrolling through the apps in a futile attempt to feel better.
From this exercise, I have realized the cyclical nature of my weekend phone use habits. Now that I am conscious and aware of this behavior, I have a great desire to reduce time on distracting apps.
