Is 'brain rot' real? Brain experts weigh in on the impact of screens

Doomscrolling. Instagram obsessions. Mindless YouTube video viewing. Distracting behaviours, yes, but can they actually rot a person's brain?
Last year, Oxford University Press designated "brain rot" as its word of the year, defining it as the "supposed deterioration of a person's mental or intellectual state" caused by overconsuming "trivial or unchallenging" material found on social media and other online platforms.
"It's what happens when you consume too much low-quality online content, which is like junk food for the brain," said Dr Andreana Benitez, an associate professor in the Department of Neurology at the Medical University of South Carolina in the United States.
But whether that content is actually harming the brain – and how – remains unclear.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), half of teenagers in the US spend four hours or more looking at screens each day, and global estimates suggest adults may be online an average of more than six hours per day.
There are no federal health guidelines for how many hours of daily screen time are appropriate for teens or adults.
Researchers lack sufficient data to fully understand the concept of brain rot and what it might lead to.
"There really isn't a coherent science around it," Benitez said.
There is, however, CDC data showing that 1 in 4 teenage frequent scrollers report feeling anxious or depressed.
Some research suggests problems with heavy online use may begin quite young. Adolescents who spend greater amounts of time in front of screens may be more likely to experience mental health issues, including depression, anxiety, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and oppositional defiant disorder, and related physical symptoms such as pain, dizziness, or nausea.
That's according to a 2024 analysis of data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development study, the largest long-term child brain development study in the US.
Other studies have potentially linked brain rot to emotional desensitization, cognitive overload, negative self-worth, and impaired executive function skills, including memory, planning, and decision-making.
While there's no evidence that hours of daily screen time are changing the structure of the human brain, it's what's not happening during those hours that could be harmful, especially for young people whose brains are still developing, said Dr Costantino Iadecola, director and chair of Feil Family Brain and Mind Research Institute at Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York City.
The more time young people spend in front of screens, the less time they spend being physically active or having face-to-face human interactions that supply the developing brain with critical, complex sensory and emotional input, he said.
"Brain development requires diversity of exposures," Iadecola said.
"When you are on your phone, you are not getting these other experiences. We are substituting artificial interactions for human interactions, and artificial interactions lack the complexity of the human experience – the verbal, sensory, and emotional reactions we have after interacting with people".
It's not just screen time that matters – it's also screen content, Benitez said.
"If you consume excessive amounts of low-quality online content, you are more likely to be exposed to information that might distort your perception of reality and harm your mental health," she said.
Cycling through large amounts of negative content can also leave a person mentally exhausted, she said.
But how much is too much has yet to be determined, Benitez said. Sticking to her junk food analogy, she likened short periods of screen time to the occasional junk food snack.
"One bag of chips might not be that bad, but if you're eating three at a time, that might be a problem," she said.
Helping kids – and adults – consume a healthier online diet isn't easy, Benitez said, because so much of modern life, from schoolwork to shopping, entertainment, and socializing, involves online applications.
"With kids, screens are a part of their lives," she said. "It's how they get a lot of information".
But, she said, "it's incumbent upon adults to curate the content, make sure they are consuming content that's good for them and in a way that does not result in mental fatigue. We need to make sure they are engaging in critical thinking as they engage with screens".
For both children and grown-ups, Benitez also cautioned against scrolling before bedtime.
"Consuming arousing information and being exposed to light when your body should be winding down for sleep might affect your sleep," she said.
The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests families develop screen-time plans together and encourage usage that builds creativity and connections with family and friends.
It also suggests parents emphasise the importance of offline activities such as sports, music, art, and other hobbies.
The AAP also notes that some screen use may be "healthy and positive," a point both Benitez and Iadecola agreed with.
"You could be consuming good content," Benitez said. "There's a value judgment in this".
Iadecola suggested making sure online usage is "purpose-appropriate. It's OK to use the technology for whatever task is at hand. The problem is when it becomes addictive behavior. Everything in moderation".
As bird flu spreads across Europe and jumps to more animal species, health experts warn that gaps in surveillance and preparedness could leave the region vulnerable to future threats to human health.
Avian influenza has been spreading at elevated levels worldwide over the past five years, including in wild and farm birds in the European Union.
Hungary has reported the most outbreaks since last autumn, followed by Germany, the Netherlands, and poultry giant Poland.
But in recent years, bird flu has also spread to mink, cats, a captive bear, and other mammals, raising the risk that the virus will eventually reach people.
Tens of millions of birds and other animals have been culled to keep that from happening, but gaps in surveillance systems increase the likelihood that the virus could circulate undetected and become harder to control.
Since 2003, about half of the nearly 1,000 people infected with H5N1 bird flu globally have died.
Now, EU health officials say public health risks remain low, and there is no evidence of human-to-human transmission.
But preparations are already underway: the European Commission recently clinched a deal to secure more than 27 million influenza vaccines in case of a pandemic.
Officials are also eyeing an outbreak among dairy cows in the United States – which has spread to people, infecting 70 and killing one – as a reminder to monitor animals beyond birds and mink, which are more prone to infection.
"It's not a time to really sit back and relax and say, 'oh well, this is just business as usual,'" Marion Koopmans, who directs the centre of excellence at the Global Virus Network and leads the viroscience department at Erasmus Medical Centre in the Netherlands, told Euronews Health.
"It has really changed compared with just a few years ago," she added. "It's not a good situation to have".
EU countries actively monitor wild birds and poultry for avian influenza. When they find infections, they must take steps to stamp out the virus, such as culling birds and imposing farm restrictions.
Now, with the US cattle outbreak in mind, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) is working with member states to boost surveillance in cows and other mammals, according to Alessandro Broglia, one of the agency's senior scientists.
"There is a kind of reactivity and enhanced preparedness in Europe, also to prevent the infection in cattle and other farm animals," Broglia told Euronews Health.
Vaccination is also playing a bigger role. In 2023, France began immunising birds, a move it says has helped its poultry industry recover after outbreaks ravaged its farms and annihilated tens of millions of birds.
And last summer, Finland became the first EU country to offer bird flu vaccines to people, doling out jabs to 10,000 workers who were at higher risk of infection.
Even so, EU audits have identified gaps in these systems that could be just large enough for the virus to slip through undetected.
Over the past two years, they have found delays in setting up restriction zones to prevent the virus from spreading in Poland; "limited effectiveness" in Portugal's early warning system for poultry infections; shortcomings in investigations of suspected cases in Spain; and poor risk assessment, a lack of surveillance, and inadequately trained staff in Hungary that constitute "crucial weaknesses" that have not been rectified since the country was last audited in 2020.
A Commission spokesperson told Euronews Health that Spain and Portugal have taken steps to fix these issues, but that it is 'seeking additional commitments' from Hungary and Poland, which suspended poultry exports last month due to outbreaks.
Alexandre Fediaevsky, acting head of preparedness and resilience at the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH), said that 'in all countries, Europe included, there is still some room for improving biosecurity and early warning systems'.
But there has been some resistance from some farmers and poultry industry groups, who fear new rules and restrictions could threaten their businesses.
"We need to have some strategic dialogue with the industry," Fediaevsky told Euronews Health, but "it will be a long process to really transform the production systems".
The EU and the US are not the only places grappling with elevated bird flu risks. Last week, the Commission said poultry and meat imports from Brazil had been halted after the country confirmed its first bird flu outbreak on a farm.
For now, bird flu appears to pose a greater risk to the EU's food supply than to public health. However, Koopmans warned that without stronger measures to curb the virus' spread among birds, the bloc could be caught off guard if human infections begin to emerge.
"Let's also not become negligent," she said, "because this is how these viruses eventually trigger pandemics".

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