YouTube and Media Habits

Media habits, self regulation, and what it means to be productive

By: Quinn McClurg

Growing up surrounded by the Internet and steeped in meme culture, it comes as no surprise that my use of YouTube was destined to eventually reach apocalyptic levels. Over the entirety of 2020 and the majority of 2021, it wasn’t unusual for me to spend four hours a day on YouTube alone. Of course, this might sound outrageous and even obsessive (I’m sure it was on some level), but if you take worldwide events into consideration, I feel like it becomes pretty understandable. 

When it’s boiled down, I believe YouTube provides users with two different types of content: education and entertainment. The educational side of YouTube makes it easy to justify spending time on the platform (given one thinks learning something new is a productive use of their time), while the entertainment side makes it easier to spend more time on the platform (given inherent tendencies for humans to seek pleasure). Most videos on YouTube are an effective blend of both of these types of content, but for the common person, entertainment alone provides more of an appeal than information alone. For example, a YouTuber who makes video essays with the primary goal of education will reach a larger audience and have more appeal if they provide entertainment of some kind; to encourage the uninitiated to engage with and learn from your content, you have to make it accessible by making it appealing and enjoyable. On the other hand, other YouTubers rely on producing content that seeks only to entertain, given it is enjoyable and easy to consume; no extra effort is required to make this content worthwhile. It is easier to view videos like this as a waste of time or as having nothing of substance. As a result, it is harder to justify spending time on. YouTube is a sum of two parts, the stronger and more enjoyable part being entertainment, while education plays the weaker but more justifiable role.

YouTube is no different from any other social media platform; it could be considered addictive in terms of both engineering and consumption. Algorithms provide an individual with content they find enjoyable, while consuming and spending time with creators and communities provides rewarding emotional and social bonds. The more time you spend with creators you enjoy, the more the algorithm becomes trained to find similar content. The more similar content it finds, the more creators you enjoy and the more content you consume. YouTube’s social, emotional, and technological bonds have been purposefully designed to encourage and increase time spent on the platform.

When discussing social media habits, it’s easy for the conversation to end in sentiments of doom and gloom, especially when speaking about dependence or addiction. But compared to other social media platforms, I believe that YouTube has more of an emphasis on self-regulation. Content on YouTube is primarily audio-visual and usually long-form, making it more of a commitment to watch than other forms of digital and social media. For example, an app like Instagram, with content that is primarily visual and less substantive, proves to be more accessible and less of a commitment, therefore encouraging more use. Additionally, platforms like TikTok (which seem to serve the same purposes as YouTube) are made more accessible, usable, and bingeable due to short-form videos. Other factors, such as the entertaining nature of most of this content or the social aspect of the platform, contribute positively to TikTok’s accessibility, usability, and bingeability. YouTube encourages more active watching and listening to engage with content, requiring more temporal and attentive resources. Thus, in requiring more commitment than other mediums, YouTube is inherently less bingeable, less addictive, and more encouraging of regulation. 

I do not mean to say that YouTube isn’t addictive or harmful in other ways. Misinformation and harmful content can still be spread on this platform, negatively impacting user’s physical, mental, or social health, but this only emphasizes the importance of self regulation and literacy in the digital and informational world. Nowadays, my average use of YouTube is down to about 45 minutes a day, and I would like to think that this knowledge of the platform and its structure helped to decrease my screen time. I hope this knowledge will encourage you to be mindful in your media consumption and help to decrease your screen time as well. If it doesn't, well, there will always be time to (right after the next video, of course).