Context:
- My partner is Brazilian
- I’ve spent time in Brazil
- There is a large Brazilian community where I live
- I have multiple friends & colleagues that are from Brazil
Having said all of that, Brazil is massive so I still only have a small sample size to go off of.
The Question I was chatting with my partner about screen time the other day. They were saying that there time has gone down recently (it’s about 6.5 hours per day on average).
If we’re watching a TV show and we pause to get some refreshments, they’ll go straight to Instagram/TikTok while I’m up. It’s not even that I’m up for a long time — like 2 minutes
It got me think about the other Brazilians I know. The vast majority of them would be the same. I noticed this while in Brazil as well, basically everyone used Instagram for news and gossip (all the time).
Again, my sample size is pretty small compared to the population of Brazil but from my experience working and engaging socially with people from all over the world, Brazilians seem to be at the top of this “list” of always being online. Is all of this true (for the most part) across the population or is just skewed significantly for me?
personal context, I average 3.5-4.5 screen on time per day. I do use my phone for work as well, so occasionally it’s higher
Why do you think this has anything to do with Brazil? And why is this necessarily a bad thing? You think people should just be staring at the wall while they wait for you?
I noticed it the most with my colleagues/friends who are Brazilian. It sparked my curiosity so I asked. I mentioned in my post that my sample size is small (in the grand scheme of things) and my data might be skewed.
No. I was curious and asked a question. My question was more related to how often these things happen and for how long.
Brazilian here, from the capital. Just this morning I saw a bit on the news saying that we (Distrito Federal) have the highest cell phone use time per day of the country.
As personal anecdotes and observations (also very limited to my geographic location), people here still care way too much about tiktok and instagram. For a lot of them, it’s where they get their news, as the very local (amateur) news have a profile on either or both. Besides that, shitty memes galore.
Me being the “weirdo” that scoffs at social media, I can’t say much besides what I can see. My screen time is almost entirely on computer, the phone getting my attention just to message people on whatsapp.
Here in the US, a huge population goes straight to their phone any time they have more than 20 unoccupied seconds. It’s just reflex for many, not sure it’s specific to any given country at this point.
Why? IMO, if someone can’t go 20 seconds without needing to doom scroll, that’s sad.
Can confirm, almost everything is done through apps here, especially the green one, consequently the screen time is very high.
Then you get socially isolated, simple as. It’s gotten to a point where even the government has started issuing digital only documents like the voter ID card. Not to mention some stores and services have no way of communication outside WhatsApp.
The “good” thing is that, despite their steep price, basically everyone has a smartphone, even beggars carry them.
the government has started issuing digital only documents like the voter ID card
I remember having a blast cursing the gov.br’s ass-backwards UX (one screen for login, the next screen you put the password) and its utter inability to fucking reset my fucking password. Seriously, the page would display a stupid javascript error clearly indicating that no-fucking-one tested that shit.
It’s almost as bad everywhere in the world. The only true way to avoid this is to do activities outside where using your phone is inconvenient.
Another alternative is the “cellphone box”. I got a friend who does this all the time when he invites us to his home; you put the cell phone in a cardboard box as you enter his house, and forget about it until you pick it up as you leave. He does this because he wants people to actually chat and drink instead of staring their cell phones, it works great.
…that makes me wonder if, due to the decreasing role of religion and the lack of other decent “third spaces”, the internet isn’t filling this role, not just in Brazil but across the globe. I mean… at least in my city the third spaces would be mostly bars and malls, that’s fine for some but not for most people.
