Addictive Design Tricks Keeping You Hooked on Social Media

Have you ever opened an app for “just five minutes”… only to look up and realise an hour has disappeared? That’s not an accident - it’s by design. Social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube have spent billions engineering addictive experiences that keep you hooked.

In this video, I break down five powerful UX patterns that manipulate your attention, including infinite scroll, autoplay, FOMO triggers, and loss aversion. You’ll learn how these design tricks work, why they’re so effective, and most importantly, how to break free from them.

-- In this video you’ll learn about: --

00:00 Intro
00:42 Infinite Scroll & Auto-Play
01:43 Variable Rewards
03:11 Loss Aversion
04:28 FOMO: The Fear of Missing Out
05:35 The ‘Just One More’ Effect
06:44 Now You See the Game

#UXPsychology #SocialMediaAddiction #DesignEthics #AttentionEconomy #HookedByDesign

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