Social media harms have been well documented for years, but only more recently has the discussion of harms turned towards mental health impacts. Within this, digital addiction to social media, and the role of technology and design in facilitating this addiction has come into focus. This paper aims to summarize the state of digital addiction and addictive design research related to social networks to inform policymakers, researchers and civil society on actionable next steps for regulation on addictive design in social media. This research and report, conducted and created by Convocation Research + Design with Dr. Romayne Gad el Rab, was commissioned by Bits of Freedom with support from Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie. Across 2025, we conducted an extensive literature review, interviewed 12 experts across psychiatry, mental health, policy, technology and design; and held an interactive workshop for feedback on our findings.

Team: Dr. Romanye Gad el Rab, Convocation Research & Design