Instagram to Nudge People to ‘Take a Break’ From Scrolling

Instagram will now nudge people to take a break after a while, every now and then. Users will also be able to set time-lapse as per their preference. 

The news came as Insta’s parent company Meta Inc. is battling a lawsuit against the accusations that too much time spent on the platform hurts the mental well-being of the teenagers.

How will the beloved social media platform notify the people?

Well, the app will send pop-up messages when the user has spent a lot of time looking at a particular topic. Along with that, it will also suggest exploring other subjects.

User can decide when to be nudged

Yes, people will be able to decide when they want to be notified of the break. “Users also can decide to be nudged to take a break after they have spent 10, 20 or 30 consecutive minutes on the app, ” Instagram said Tuesday in a blog post. The platform will then remind users about alternative activities to social media such as going for a walk or taking a series of deep breaths, Instagram head of well-being and safety Vaishnavi J said in an interview.”

When you’ve been spending a long period of time — 20 minutes for example being a fairly long period of time — it is very valuable for you to then get a little notification reminding you to take a break,” she said. “You may not feel like you’ve been spending that much time on the app because you’ve been doing five or six different things in those 20 minutes.”, reported Bloomberg in a report.

Last month, a group of U.S. state attorneys general announced an investigation into Instagram’s efforts to engage children and young adults. 

Instagram announced in November that it had begun testing the take-a-break feature. The company didn’t release any statistics about what percentage of people actually get off the app once they have received a reminder, but said once teenagers turn on the feature, more than 90% keep it on.