Episode 162: The Science of Doom Scrolling - How Constant Stimulation Is Rewiring Your Brain Host: Matt Marney

In this solo episode, Matt reflects on a recent experience stepping away from the high-stimulation environment of Dubai and noticing what changed when that constant input was reduced.

This episode is not about location. It’s about what happens to your brain and nervous system when you are exposed to continuous stimulation — especially through your phone.

Matt takes a deep dive into the science behind doom scrolling, dopamine, and why modern digital habits are making it harder to focus, regulate emotions, and function in everyday life.

In this episode, Matt explores:

• What doom scrolling actually is and why it’s so addictive 
• The role of dopamine and how constant stimulation hijacks reward systems 
• How phone use impacts attention, focus, and cognitive performance 
• The effect of high stimulation on the nervous system and baseline mood 
• Why “normal life” can start to feel flat or underwhelming 
• The connection between low stimulation, boredom, and recovery 
• Practical ways to reduce stimulation and regain control of your attention 

This episode is for anyone who feels constantly distracted, overstimulated, or stuck in a loop of checking their phone without knowing why.

It’s not about removing technology. It’s about understanding what it’s doing to you — and taking back control.

If you have a question for the podcast or are interested in working with Matt, you can reach out at:
 • Email: info@wellnesseducationdubai.com
 • Website: www.wellnesseducationdubai.com
• Instagram: @wellness_education_dubai
• Facebook: @mattmarneyfitness
• LinkedIn: Matt Marney (Wellness Education Dubai)

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

The Matt Marley Podcast. Hello, welcome to episode 162 of the Matt Marley Podcast. I hope you're well, guys. So today's episode is being recorded on the 23rd of March 2026. And just over three weeks ago, uh, Israel, US, and Iran began a conflict in the Middle East. And as many of you will know, I live in Dubai. So this has been an interesting, very strange period of time for all of us living in the region. And there's been lots of stimulation, news cycles, phone alerts, uh, noise overhead. Um these are projectiles being shot out of the sky by the UA government, who, by the way, have done a stellar job. Uh, but nonetheless, uh, it has been quite a busy period, very stimulating period. Now, what struck me wasn't how I felt during the beginning of this conflict, it was actually when I stepped away. So, just over 10 days ago, uh, the school holidays, by the way, were brought forward in the UAE. Uh, myself and my wife decided to get away for a period of time. We are back in London right now. This is where I'm recording this podcast. And what I noticed within a few days of arriving, and this is actually this came up during my meditation practice, was you know how jacked up my nervous system was, uh, how scattered my mind was. And I noticed this uh whilst meditating, it just felt more a more sense of calm, I had more concentration, more samadhi, uh, I was consuming less junk food, the urgency to pick the phone up, lessened, and I was able to start reading my book again, and all this stuff I observed in the first few days, and I've had a bit of time to reflect now. This is all hindsight, um, but um it was obvious that the situation I found myself in uh was having a profound impact on me, on my nervous system, or my patterns of thinking. And it would be easy to just say it was because I was in this part of the world and we wouldn't feel this way. And yes, there were a few days where there were lots of loud noises which can be unsettling, but on reflection, it's it's quite obvious what I was doing. And my wife commented on this is I was watching a lot of news, I was staring at my phone constantly, I was listening to podcasts, they were all around the whole situation. And I'm someone who talks a lot about well-being, about ways that we can manage our nervous systems and our patterns of thinking. And it dawned on me that this environment, this situation that I put myself in, was pretty normal for a lot of the population. And so I suppose today's episode is not really about you know Dubai and the situation in the Middle East. It's it's more about what happens to the nervous system when it's constantly stimulated by the modern world and in particular phones. So that's today's podcast, a bit of science, a bit of why, and hopefully some suggestions that may help. Let's get started. So I think it's fair to say that the modern world is highly stimulating. Uh, when I grew up, there were no phones, we had three channels on the TV, and you would watch the news either in the morning or when you got back from school or work, you'd watch maybe the six o'clock news, half an hour segment, and that would be it. Uh compare that to the modern world, we have multiple news channels running 24 hours a day. We have social media, we have short form, long form YouTube, we have podcasts on about any topic in the world and multiple different views, and we have this all being delivered through a piece of technology called the smartphone, which we all have sitting in our pocket, streaming this stuff directly to us. Factor in uh negativity bias we have as a species, an inbuilt negativity bias. We are more drawn to negative uh news, negative stories, and this is from a survival standpoint, and then tie that in with the algorithms which are there to feed us what we're already looking at, and then obviously the whole monetization of content. So there are people who are earning their living from eyeballs, clicks, so the more inflammatory the content, what I'm trying to say is that the motivation to be divisive is higher than ever. And the other thing we have to consider is that our brains are not designed to be aware of every single event that happens globally instantly. If a train crash happens in Delhi, we know about it instantly. If there is a school shooting in the US, we know about it. It's this constant um exposure to this information which is making, I suppose, the world feel very unsafe. And I'll give you an example. I'm currently in London. I've lived in the Middle East for the last seven years, and the narrative, the thing that I'm asked often from people who don't come from the UK is that London is a crime-ridden city, that it's dangerous, that you know it's out of control, and the truth is it isn't. I'm in London at the moment. It's in fact, actually, if you look at the statistics on crime in most western cities, violent crime is at an all-time low, or certainly in the last 30 or 40 years. Yes, things like shoplifting and mobile phone theft is on the app. This is the stuff that people can see, so they're attaching it to the whole picture, but it makes perfect sense if you are constantly being fed information about how dangerous and scary the world is. It's perfectly natural for us or our nervous systems to be on high alert. And I suppose the simple piece of advice you may give someone is well, simply stop looking at your phone so much. Stop looking at the news. Well, sadly, that is easier said than done. Our brains and our nervous systems are not designed to know about everything that's going on in the world, but just simply in our immediate vicinity. So, you know, the tribe that we lived in and the area that we're in. So if there was any threat or danger, this is an inbuilt survival instinct, the brain needs to resolve any sort of open loops. So, for example, you found out that there was a rival tribe that were, you know, on the horizon. You would want to know where they are, what they're doing, they come any closer, they've stolen food, and you would constantly look for more information until you feel safe in that situation's result. So, I mean, the example I use is when I was the first few days of the conflict uh in the Middle East, I was constantly looking at the news and looking for more information. This is what they say we look for. We look for more information to understand things better so you can you can feel safe. And I was literally constantly picking up my phone, uh, looking for more information, trying to find out as much as I could to assess risk. Um it was it was very obvious. We have this attention economy which is worth over seven trillion dollars, and so these social media companies are earning money from our attention. They own this through advertising and selling our data, but that's another another topic. So we've got all this information, all this negative news about the world, but then factor in something like social media, which happens to be on the same device, you know, and you've got things like intermittent reinforcement, which is a technique that social media companies use. If you post something on social media, they they wouldn't give you all your likes and all your comments in the first hour. They kind of you know put it out across the day. It's a it's a technique they use in gambling, you know. You go pick your phone up, all there's more likes and comments. There's the whole you know, novelty, um, which again is that is associated with gambling, with things like you know, um fruit machines, uh, and there's obviously the algorithm itself, your work emails, your music, your sat nav. So it's a really difficult environment to navigate because there is so much contained within this simple iPhone. So much of our life, so much of our world is is there that we are constantly being drawn back. I suppose the next thing to look at is okay, we are looking at this stuff regularly. We are all aware of it, we all know we shouldn't be looking at our phones as much as we should. I suppose the important question now is what impact is it having on us? And once we understand that, what can we do to make some change? The first consequence of this over-stimulation, and I suppose I'm framing this around constant looking at your phone, is the impact that it has on dopamine. Now, dopamine is a neurotransmitter, and it's normally associated with pleasure, but it's it's more about drive, the urge to pursue pleasure or reward. So things like oxytocin, serotonin, these are neurotransmitters that are associated with pleasure, but dopamine is that drive, and I think it's I don't want to get too technical, but if you're you know someone who is conscious about your performance at work or even if you've got kids, it's really important to understand the impact it has on our everyday life. And dopamine is often the driver. In fact, if you'd like to read a book, it's a brilliant book by Daniel Lieberman, The Molecule of Moore, fantastic book. Uh, will frighten you after you've read it, uh, but it may be the catalyst for you to actually implement some of the suggestions I'll make today. But dopamine is it's released when there's a possibility of reward. And when we pick the phone up, um we we get there's an easy reward, there's novelty, there are funny cat videos, there's maybe something stimulating. But I think every time we pick up the phone, we get this artificially high surge of dopamine. We start to connect, picking up the phone, this connection between you know drive and reward with social media, and it's quite an easy fix. We're not you know that the real world doesn't contain the level of entertainment and novelty that we get from picking up the phone. And I mean, I'll I'll level with you. You know, I I if I've been looking at social media and then I feel that drive to pick my phone up again, I might maybe not go on Instagram this time. I'll go on Facebook or I'll look at news, BBC News or BBC Sport or LinkedIn. I mean, there is just so much there, so much novelty. Um, anyway, the point I'm trying to make is we keep picking the phone up, we keep getting this connection of dopamine is is released to pick up the phone and then the reward happens. So that connection strengthens. What happens is that we get reduced sensitivity to normal rewards, you know that that that baseline shifts, and it means that we we don't really get much joy from normal life. I mean, you've only got to look at people who are maybe walking through a park. I did it earlier. I went for a walk, admittedly, I was listening to a podcast, but it's I'm walking through this wonderful park in North London, and so many people walking their dogs and staring at their phones. You know, what would have been a lovely walk in nature? People are staring at their phone. In fact, it it baffles me how many people are looking at their phone whilst walking along the street. I mean, driving. People that are feeling this urge, rational brain. I should not be looking at my phone whilst I'm driving, but yet people do. It's unbelievable the statistics around accidents and mobile phones. So we get this reduced sensitivity to normal rewards, so stimulation drops quickly. So you've been, I'll give you an example, I think doom scrolling. So you you know, you hear that term, might have been sat on the sofa on your own, and you've been scrolling for I don't know, 10 minutes, 15 minutes. And when you put the phone down, you feel rubbish. This is a common feeling, a common experience that people have, and it is about this this you know, artificially high level of dopamine and reward, and then this crash after you put the phone down. So the normal world feels very bland and very unfulfilling. And then there is obviously cognitive fatigue. We don't appreciate that when we're consuming information, consuming stuff. It has it has a cost. There's adrenalization. We we become stimulated when we look at our phone, particularly if we're looking at news around current affairs, global conflicts, inflammatory characters, particularly people that we don't particularly like. There are certain world leaders at the moment who just the sound of their voice and the ridiculous stuff that comes out of their mouth triggers me. It angers me, and this is all artificial. We're not designed to experience this level of emotion so easily. You know, one minute we were watching TV, a cooking program, and then the next minute we are angry at certain world leaders. So this adrenalization, this drop of dopamine, this cognitive fatigue, there's the element of comparing despair. Amongst it all, you know, you don't even realize it's going on. You see someone that works in your industry, or someone at school, or someone at work, and you get these feelings. Now, what this experience does is it makes us feel rubbish, and we can all identify with that. She's gonna have some nutrient. So doom scrolling. Now, the big concern for us as people looking to go about our lives and perform well at work or study or be present for friends and family is this dopamine, this reduced sensitivity to normal rewards means that we find it hard, we lack the motivation to do normal things in life. I don't know how many people I've spoken to in the last year who are talking about the fact that they are struggling to read books. Yeah, we've got audio books, we've got podcasts. So many people I know are struggling to read. Now, when we think about it, reading requires some effort, some level of concentration, and it just doesn't feel fulfilling. Now, there is the aspect of attention, and we're going to talk about that. So we call it fragmented attention, which comes from all these short videos, and that is true, but I do think, based off what I understand, is that this neurotransmitter, dopamine, is making things in everyday life seem really challenging. Students at university, I read a report about the way that they're delivering content now in universities. Kids, students are not able to read books, they are giving them TED Talks, they're giving them very passive ways to consume information. And this dopamine, this drive to act, to pursue, is what's gonna help you make better choices around nutrition and food and exercise, revise, do deep work. So this constant looking at phones and this reward, the dopamine reward connection is just making life seem a bit more challenging. ADHD. You know, rates of ADHD now and diagnosis are at an all-time high, adults, children. We've got this obvious polarization which is going on in the world, and this is in every area, politics is an obvious one, but nutrition is polarized, the Pilates world, which I'm a member of, is also polarized. I mean, we are being drawn in different directions with the fragmented attention aspects as well. I talk about this a lot in the corporate settings. There's something called switch costs. I've spoken about this countless times. So the example I make is you will be on task doing some work, you might be in flow state, a WhatsApp message or a notification comes through on your phone, you pick the phone up, you then you know look at the message, you put the phone back down. It's going to take you around 25 minutes to get back to that level of attention and focus that you had before. There's also the cognitive residue, so you know that you're never fully back on task. When you've been looking at your phone, looking at the news or social media, you've got emotional residue. So that anger that I spoke about earlier. So I might have been slightly triggered by a certain world leader using language or talking in a particular way. Well, I carry that emotional residue. As I said before, it's not normal to just jump from watching a cooking program to looking at a video that infuriates me. That's not what the modern world's about. And I'm going to carry that into my relationships, into my reactions to colleagues at work. And so one of the main takeaways here is constant looking, picking up this device, which by the way, I'm not saying you get rid of, it's a part of the world. But what you have to consider is that it's having an impact on your ability to enjoy normal life. Do the stuff that does give you rewards, but requires some effort. Like on. The walk or getting the revision done or getting that task done. And look, what I want you to do is I don't want you to judge yourself here, there are thousands of engineers the other side of that phone hacking this primitive brain, but reframe it in a way your brain is just simply adapting to the environment that we create. And look, this phone, the apps on these phones, they're the most powerful attention-seeking devices known to man. So the question is we're fully aware of what it's doing to us. What can we do to change it? Now I'm conscious that this is maybe sounding like an anti-phone rant. Um, this is not about criticizing phones. We all use them, they're part of modern life, they're here to stay. But what I would like to finish with is offering up some practical tips for you so you can start to have a little bit more control around these devices, which are impacting our neurophysiology, they are impacting our ability to function in everyday life. And I think once you understand the impact that it's having on our sensitivity, our baseline with dopamine, that's hopefully more of a motivation to take some action around it. And the first thing I'm gonna offer up is phone-free windows ideally protecting first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Super helpful. And these phones is not just about looking at social media, emails, WhatsApp. There's so much attached to these devices, and if we're looking at work emails late at night, that can spike a fight or flight response, quartzile adrenaline, and impact sleep, that has a knock-on effect for everything the next day. And also first thing in the morning, particularly if you have a family to organize, things to do, school drop-offs, you want to be present, and if you are picking that phone up within the first half an hour, you're already off of the races, the mind's away, planning, preparing, and this has an impact on our physiology. Now, if that feels a bit too much, when you do feel that urge, and I'll go back to that point, if it feels too much, lean into what that feeling represents. That urge which we can't quite put our finger on. We know we I know it instinctively, you just pick that phone up. What is that? Well, understand that's a neurotransmitter. This is chemistry, this is an urge, a drive, it's dopamine. So once you start to connect that, you understand what it is, and don't judge yourself if you do pick the phone up. But you're hopefully less judgmental. And when you can recognize it and see it for what it is, you're probably hopefully you've got more of a why, you buy in a little bit more to the rest of these suggestions. But if morning and evening just feel a bit too much at this stage, maybe try something I use, which is TV time. All right, I know I'm I'm staring at a screen and watching entertainment, but if I am sitting down in the evening and with my wife, and I want to watch whatever it is we're watching together, the phone is in a basket in the kitchen. It's really helpful. If you are about to sit down and do some work, working from home. I mean, if you're at work, the phone should be outside anyway, close tabs down, there's all this stuff. Having the phone, so controlling your environment in a different room is really going to help. Going out for walks without the phone could also be that phone-free window. Other things you can do, notifications, turn them off. Still blows my mind when I hear people's phones, like noises. When a notification comes in, there's a there's a ping. I mean, that is going to draw your attention, whatever you're doing. Uh, notifications on your emails, on your Apple watches, like turn them off. Um, even the blue tick on WhatsApp, that was so freeing for me. And I get it, people want to know if a message has been seen, but you know, if I've looked at a message and I have the blue ticks situation, I feel an urge to respond to that person because I know. So it really helped. So look, these social media companies, the metas of this world, those blue ticks are there for a reason. They're there so you pick the phone up again and you message. So reducing notifications, controlling the environment, putting the phone out of the room is really helpful. Now, in terms of bringing the dopamine sensitivity back to normal, low stimulation exposure, things like standing in a queue waiting for your coffee, just observe what happens there. There's an urge, you just grab the phone before you know it. That's dopamine. So maybe seeing if you can, you know, just for this week, when you are waiting for your coffee or you're waiting in the line at the supermarket, just notice the urge and see if you can resist. This applies to the the bus stop or waiting at the tube, it's just so easy. I don't say easy, there's a drive, there's a physiological drive to look at the phone. Car journeys. I mean, I'm I'm the same podcasts or music. See if you can just be comfortable in a low stimulation environment. The whole walking thing, and this is something I probably need to work on. I do a lot of walking, I always talk about the amount of steps I've done, but I'm always consuming stuff, you know, the whole atomic habits change clear concept, habit stacking. It's great in terms of productivity, but when we're dealing with stuff like you know, bringing our dopamine sensitivity back to normal, listening to a podcast or associating walks with just stimulation is is with say information, is probably not the best thing. So walking without stimulation, if you're doing work at home, you're trying to be productive, single task, no background music. That's something I've had to recognize recently. You know, just switch off the music in the background. You know, can I can I just stay on task without something else stimulating me? And again, this is about dopamine, the reward, the drive and reward connection. You know, just just doing some work doesn't feel stimulating enough, feels like too much effort, but yet chucking music, more of a reward and more likely to do it. The reality is you're probably not on task, even with background music, you're not giving this task your full attention. Now, if you're someone who struggles to read a book, introduce reading. I've been doing this over the last six months. Um, I've been putting the book um next to the sofa where I sit. So if I it's just there, it's out, it's ready, I sit down, it's during the day. Uh I find it difficult to read in the evening. And actually, it's an interesting uh point to raise. This is something I've I realized how stimulating the phone is. I spoke earlier about adrenalization and your nervous system being jacked up when you look at social media. So I was using it as a technique. So I'd be reading in bed at night, and I'd start to feel the heavy eyelids, I'm getting tired. I'd literally put the book down, pick my phone up, scroll Instagram for about three minutes, put the phone down, and I'm awake again. So there's just an example of what this stuff does to our nervous system, we're not even aware of it. But getting back to reading a book, um, trying not to check your phone immediately after you finish reading. This is something I notice when I meditate. So I use my phone as an alarm when I meditate, and what I catch myself doing is as soon as I finish meditating, I stop the alarm on the phone, I then scroll. So all this stuff is is helpful, and it's just having that awareness. Controlling the environment, which we've mentioned before, is really important. Bone out the room, but the environment can also include accounts that you follow. So I I unfollowed a few accounts recently, people that just I don't like the content they're posting. It upsets me for whatever reasons, not saying they're wrong and I'm right. Unfollow people. So if there's an account that creates comparison, anxiety, outrage, just simply unfollow. It's quite empowering. Do it. And so the point I'm trying to make is be more intentional with what you consume. Don't necessarily just put the news on. And I was doing this when the conflict started. I would get up in the morning, I would go on Instagram, I would see official channels for the UAE, I would look at those, I might see a couple of videos, I'd then put Al Jazeera on, I'd then put BBC on, I'd then put Sky News on. And I found myself jumping from news channel to news channel, looking for more anxiety-inducing headlines or videos of plumes of smoke in areas in the Middle East. And by the way, the same videos are being used over and over again, and this is something else we have to remember. When we're consuming content about a situation, they use the same. In fact, some video footage was not from the region that they were reporting on. So just be aware of that. Have this more intentional approach to what we consume, and ask yourself, why am I opening this? So that there's plenty of things that you can start to lean into, small things that you can do. Look, I don't think what I've said today, anything I've said today will come as a surprise. We all know that the phone, the social media, the polarizing nature of the modern world is not good for us. And it's no surprise that we have an anxiety, a mental health crisis globally. Anyone that is exposed to this stuff, this tech, in the way it's being governed, and again, this is a completely separate topic, but Meta and these big tech companies have a lot to answer for. What they're doing to youngsters infuriates me. I'm getting wound up talking about it. But look, what I want you to do and take from today is look, don't blame yourself for this compulsion, this need to pick up the phone and doom scroll. But we're living in a level of stimulation the brain was never designed for. But your brain is actually doing what it's designed to do, it adapts to its environment. So rather than judging yourself, just notice it. Make a smute a few small changes, create the space, and just see how you feel. Take ownership, take agency. Speak to you soon, guys.