Why Does Scrolling Leave You More Bored?

You’re waiting for a bus with ten minutes to spare. You open your phone. Someone is restoring an old chair, but you swipe away before seeing the result. Then comes a recipe, a cat, another video… There’s plenty to watch. So why are you still bored?

Drawing on a 2024 study by Katy Tam and Michael Inzlicht, “Why Does Scrolling Leave You More Bored?” explores how switching between videos can affect our experience. Is it only about how much time we spend watching—or also about what we do with that time?

The accompanying eight-page booklet includes eleven student activities. Students compare different reasons for switching videos, distinguish research findings from possible explanations, and connect the video with W. H. Davies’s poem “Leisure” and Fragonard’s painting “Young Girl Reading.” They support their interpretations with details and write a short audio-guide script that directs a listener’s attention around the painting.

One question runs through it all: Do we want to watch something—or keep looking for something else to watch?