The Scroll That Never Ends
You've been there. It's 11 PM. You opened Instagram "for just a second." Now it's 2 AM, your thumb is sore, and you've watched 847 videos about satisfying soap cutting, relationship drama from strangers, and cats doing inexplicable things.
Welcome to the infinite scroll—one of the most psychologically potent design patterns ever created. But why does it work so well? And what does it reveal about the human mind?
The Birth of Infinite Scroll
The internet had "Next Page" buttons. Natural stopping points. Deliberate browsing.
Designer at Humanized creates infinite scroll to make browsing more "seamless."
Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest adopt infinite scroll. Engagement metrics skyrocket.
Raskin publicly expresses regret. "Like handing someone an infinite chocolate bar."
"It's as if they've handed a person a chocolate bar and said, 'Here's a chocolate bar. By the way, it's infinite.' And then that person just keeps eating chocolate forever until they realize, 'Oh wait, I've been eating nothing but chocolate.'" — Aza Raskin, Creator of Infinite Scroll
The Psychology Behind the Compulsion
Several cognitive mechanisms make infinite scroll irresistible:
Psychologist B.F. Skinner discovered that unpredictable rewards are far more addictive than predictable ones. This is why slot machines work—and why your social media feed keeps you hooked.
Most posts are mediocre. But every 10–15 scrolls, you hit gold: a hilarious meme, a shocking revelation, or something that triggers a strong emotional response. Your brain learns that the next scroll might be the rewarding one.
We remember uncompleted tasks better than completed ones. When there's no end to the feed, there's no completion. Your brain keeps a mental "tab" open, creating a subtle but persistent urge to return.
This is why closing a book feels satisfying, but closing TikTok feels like you left something unfinished.
What if you miss the most important thing? What if everyone's talking about something tomorrow and you didn't see it? The fear of missing out (FOMO) keeps you scrolling "just a little more."
Spoiler: You never will. The feed is infinite.
Flow is that sublime state where you're completely absorbed—time flies, everything fades. It's normally associated with productive activities like coding, sports, or music.
Doomscrolling hijacks this mechanism. The frictionless content stream induces a pseudo-flow state that feels good but leaves you drained afterward.
The Void That Looks Back
We created Void Scroll as a satirical mirror of this phenomenon. In the game, you scroll through the "void" of internet history—each layer taking you deeper into increasingly strange and cursed content.
The deeper you go, the weirder it gets. Sound familiar?
But unlike social media, Void Scroll makes the compulsion visible. You can see exactly how deep you've gone. You can see the time ticking. It's a commentary on the invisible design patterns that usually operate without your awareness.
Breaking the Cycle
Understanding the psychology is the first step. Here are evidence-based strategies to regain control:
The Paradox of More
We live in an era of infinite content. Every minute, 500 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube. Every second, 6,000 tweets are posted. The internet produces more content in a day than any human could consume in a lifetime.
And yet, despite—or perhaps because of—this abundance, we often feel more empty than fulfilled. The paradox of choice becomes the paradox of content: more options, less satisfaction.
"The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it." — Henry David Thoreau
- Infinite scroll exploits variable reward schedules—the same psychology as slot machines
- The Zeigarnik Effect keeps mental tabs open for unfinished feeds
- FOMO drives "just one more scroll" behavior indefinitely
- Adding friction is the most effective countermeasure
- Your attention is finite; the content is not—choose wisely
Conclusion: Reclaim Your Attention
The infinite scroll isn't going away. It's too profitable, too effective, too embedded in how we interact with the digital world. But understanding why it works gives you power.
Your attention is your most valuable resource. Every minute spent in the void is a minute not spent on something you actually care about. The scroll is infinite, but your life is not.
- Center for Humane Technology - humanetech.com
- Aza Raskin Interview, 2019 - BBC Documentary "The Social Dilemma"
- DataReportal Global Digital Report 2025
- B.F. Skinner, "Science and Human Behavior" (1953)