#Data_Pills | Ep. 1 Scrolling

Episode 1 : Scrollling

One Eiffel Tower a Day

=> The Invisible Effort Behind Scrolling

We scroll all day long. But what are we really doing?

According to the DataReportal 2024 report:

the average user spends 2h23 per day on social media.

Meanwhile, UX researchers at Meta (via UX Collective) estimate that the average scroll speed is 2.4 meters per minute. Multiply them and you get this:

~343 meters per day of vertical thumb movement. That’s almost one Eiffel Tower, climbed silently with your thumb. Every. Single. Day.

The Math Behind the Metaphor:

• Time on social media (DataReportal, 2024):

  → 2h23/day = 143 minutes

• Average scroll speed (Meta UX):

  → 2.4 meters/minute

• Daily scroll distance:

  → 143 × 2.4 = 343.2 meters/day

• Height of Eiffel Tower:

  → 330 meters

=> You are literally "climbing" a monument through micro-gestures.

But What Does That Really Mean?

Scrolling isn’t just a gesture — it’s a looped behavior that has deep impact:

•  Mental

  • Continuous scrolling reinforces dopamine-seeking loops, reducing your tolerance for stillness.

  • It shortens your attention span, as confirmed by multiple cognitive science studies (Harvard, 2022).

  • It disrupts deep processing — you read less deeply, think more shallowly.

• Physical

  • Repetitive scroll movements contribute to micro-tension in the thumb, wrist, neck, and eyes.

  • Eye fatigue, thumb joint inflammation (“texting thumb”), and posture collapse are increasingly common.

 The Illusion of Stillness

You don’t feel exhausted, because your body barely moves — but your nervous system is hyper-engaged.

The effort is real, just displaced. It’s ambient fatigue: invisible, but cumulative.

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 Research, Visuals and Sounds co-created with AI

 A project by NeoBreizh Studio

📎 Sources:

• DataReportal 2024, Global Digital Report

• UX Collective, “How far do we scroll” (Meta UX benchmark)

• Harvard Medical School, Attention Fatigue & Dopamine Loops, 2022