EXPRESS: Make it Stick: The Role of Alternative Activities in Reducing Smartphone Usage

Abstract

Sustaining behavior change is challenging when consumption is habitual, as with smartphone use. Across two longitudinal field studies involving 5,686 observations of objectively measured smartphone use from 153 individuals, we explore how to reduce smartphone usage sustainably. Our intervention leverages positive alternatives (learning a new language or engaging in walking) to sustain smartphone usage reductions after an intervention with incentives has ended. We study whether consumers who are incentivized to curb smartphone use and adopt a positive activity demonstrate greater long-term success compared to those solely incentivized to reduce smartphone use. Across both studies, participants reduced smartphone use while incentives were in place, but these reductions were not sustained after incentives were removed. However, individuals achieving both targets (instead of one) had lower social media and smartphone use during the post-treatment period relative to their baseline, especially if a higher proportion of idle time was occupied by the positive alternative. In the first study, higher engagement in the alternative activity was associated with lower self-reported social media addiction, while larger reduction in social media use was linked to improvement in subjective well-being. However, well-being findings were mixed: the second study found no effect of screen time reduction on subjective well-being.