I tracked my screen time for a year but then I started tracking what I was avoiding each time I picked up my phone and that second dataset changed how I understand my own mind - Silicon Canals

"Tracking the quantity of a behavior tells you almost nothing about its function. Screen time as a metric has the same problem as counting calories without understanding hunger. It treats every minute equally. Thirty minutes of reading a long-form article and thirty minutes of scrolling Instagram reels in a fugue state show up as the same thing. The number flattens the psychology."

"Researchers at the University of London found that the relationship between screen time and well-being is far more nuanced than the raw hours suggest - context, motivation, and the emotional state before picking up a device matter significantly more than duration. My four-hour days weren't uniformly bad. Some were productive, even restorative. Others left me feeling hollowed out. The number couldn't tell me which was which."

Screen time tracking through weekly summaries provides guilt without understanding. Raw hours consumed fail to distinguish between productive use and mindless scrolling, treating all minutes identically. Research from the University of London demonstrates that well-being's relationship with screen time depends far more on context, motivation, and emotional state than total duration. A second tracking method—pausing to note feelings before picking up the phone—reveals the actual function of device use. This emotional dataset proved more valuable than quantity metrics, showing that identical screen time durations produced vastly different outcomes depending on what triggered the phone use.

Read at Silicon Canals