"Digital Addiction"

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Event Type: 
Seminar Series
Date and Time: 
Monday, August 17, 2020
12:00 pm – 1:00 pm
Speaker: 
Hunt Allcott
New York University
Abstract: 

Digital technologies such as smartphones and social media consume a large and growing share of leisure time. While these technologies provide obvious benefits, it is often argued that they can be addictive and harmful. We lay out a model of digital addiction and estimate its parameters using a randomized experiment involving about 2000 smartphone users. We also measure treatment effects of reduced smartphone use on survey measures of smartphone addiction and subjective well-being.