Gen Z Is Trying to Log Their Way Out of Doomscrolling

Fed up with doomscrolling and worried their attention spans are shrinking, some Gen Z-ers are tracking what they watch and read to stop scrolling.

Across TikTok, Substack, and Instagram, younger generations are sharing weekly roundups of the books, films, podcasts, and long-form articles they have consumed — often under the banner of “media I consumed instead of doomscrolling.”

Social cataloging apps designed to track and share media consumption have risen in popularity, while content on creating physical media journals is also trending.

Gen Zers and millennials engaging in the trend say the practice is helping them become more intentional with the media they consume — and prove they can still focus on something longer than a TikTok.

‘Media I’ve consumed this week instead of doomscrolling’

Tracking what you read or watch isn’t new. The most popular book-logging platform, Goodreads, was created in 2006, and notebooks have existed far longer than that.

But the addictive nature of short-form content has added a new dimension to logging: it has been framed as a deliberate choice to step away from doomscrolling and become more conscious of what you consume.

This marks a growing shift to analog — as the craving for time away from screens grows stronger, people are finding ways of de-digitalizing their lives. Gen Z is swapping scrolling with in-person hobbies, while some millennials are raising their children with retro-style tech.

Maria Paula Colmenares, a 22-year-old fashion business student living in Italy, runs a Substack called “Instead of Doomscrolling” with over 448,000 subscribers.

After spending a summer vacation hooked to her phone, Colmenares wanted to find a way to be more mindful about what she was consuming online. She launched a Substack page where she shares a roundup of media she has read or listened to.

“Even thinking of YouTube, you could sit down and watch an hourlong video with no problem,” said Colmenares, talking about social media before feeds became even more personalized.

“Now, I’m sure it’s a lot harder for people to do that without grabbing your phone or doing something else — having, like, a million things going on — because you cannot stand a second without stimuli,” she added.

Since her Substack’s launch in April last year, sharing “media I’ve consumed this week instead of doomscrolling” has become a growing trend on social media.

Videos of people sharing what they have recently watched and read under the term “instead of doomscrolling” have garnered hundreds of thousands of views.

Creators often recommend a curated selection of books, Substack articles, and other long-form content they chose over scrolling.

“It really resonated with so many people,” said Colmenares.

“I think it’s been really helpful to keep track of the things that I’m consuming, because once you hold yourself accountable. It’s like: ‘OK, if I’m going to read this article and I want to remember it, and I want to have a point of view, I need to take my time to write things down,'” she added.

Thomas Webb, a professor of psychology at the University of Sheffield, reviewed 138 studies in which participants were randomly assigned either to a program that encouraged them to track their progress toward a goal or to a group that didn’t.

Based on the review, he told Business Insider that goals were more likely to be achieved when progress was physically recorded or shared with others.

“Therefore, it seems plausible that recording or sharing books, films and long-form articles with friends or followers might increase commitment to the goal of reading or watching these,” he added.

Social cataloging apps

The “media I’ve consumed this week instead of doomscrolling” trend coincides with the growing popularity of social cataloging apps among Gen Z.

As of February, the film cataloging platform Letterboxd has over 27 million members, up from 17 million this time last year, a company spokesperson told Business Insider.

And its fans skew young. Data from its recent surveys and Google Analytics showed that its core members are aged between 18 and 35 the spokesperson said.

Launched in 2007 and acquired by Amazon in 2013, Goodreads has more than 150 million members, according to an estimate in 2023. Goodreads did not provide more recent data in response to a request from Business Insider.

Its monopoly over the book-tracking world has prompted the launch of a host of other book logging apps, such as The StoryGraph and Fable.

Nadia Odunayo, the founder and CEO of The StoryGraph, which hit 5 million user signups at the end of January after launching in 2019, said the platform has helped people read more — including herself.

The StoryGraph has functions such as book discovery based on mood and options for rating books.

“We have lots of people finding, rediscovering, the love of reading that they used to have as a kid. That’s amazing,” Odunayo said.

“People saying, ‘I used to read as a kid, and as an adult, I hardly read. I would manage one book a year, and now I’ve read 60, 70, 80,'” she added.

For some, the appeal of logging and sharing the media they consume is about understanding what their tastes say about them.

“It’s less about finding new content to get into and recommendations — more so a focus on understanding yourself through the lens of your consumption, in your case, and understanding others through the lens of their consumption,” said Jad Esber, founder and CEO of social cataloging app Shelf.

Still, some critics see an element of performativity in the trend — turning media consumption into another metric to display.

The carefully curated nature of the posts and their public visibility raises the question of whether logging what you read is meaningfully different from other forms of personal branding on social media.

But for Colmenares, writing about her online media consumption has had a tangible offline effect.

“This has allowed me to read a lot more, write more in my journal, and do more offline activities,” she said. “I’m drawing again. I’m doing all of these things that I used to do but couldn’t, because I was so addicted to my phone.”