Social Media Addiction, Behaviourism, and the Limits of the Digital Services Act

This paper examines the Digital Services Act’s behaviourist framing of “platform addiction” and its reliance on stimulus–response assumptions about interface design. It argues that this model is both internally inconsistent and causally misattributed, privileging autoplay, infinite scroll, and notifications while downplaying intrapersonal, psychosocial, and structural drivers of compulsive use. To address this issue, it contends that proportionate design governance—e.g., the European Parliament’s proposed “right not to be disturbed”—should be paired with upstream measures: early identification and evidence-based care in education settings; embedded mental-health counselling with clear crisis pathways; community and anti-loneliness programmes; and policies that reduce precarity. This dual approach both blunts engagement features and reduces the conditions that amplify risk, making problematic, compulsive use less likely.