The addictive nature of social media, particularly platforms like Instagram and TikTok, leads users to spend excessive amounts of time doomscrolling. A lecturer from Stellenbosch University examined depression-related content on social media platforms such as Reddit and Twitter (now known as X) and found that by reinforcing negative emotions, users can exacerbate and deepen each other’s depression. “Words such as ‘feeling’, ‘depression’ and ‘thinking’ appear in the most frequently used word list alongside ‘feel’, ‘depressed’ and ‘think’, respectively. Marais notes that the tweets contained phrases that affirmed the user’s experience of depression in a manner that is not hyperbole, such as “I am diagnosed with depression”, “I am fighting depression” and “I suffer from depression”. It also highlights the urgent need to prioritise mental health considerations in the design of digital platforms.