Nguyen Phuong Vy says addiction to social media is eating up about 6 hours a day. The Thang Long University student says the pull is strongest on TikTok, where short clips keep her scrolling even when she is exhausted.
That routine takes time that could go to studying or resting. It also captures a wider Gen Z pattern: the same feeds that open doors can make attention harder to control.
Nguyen Phuong Vy and TikTok
Vy, 18, says she mainly browses TikTok and listens to audio. She says the habit has become almost automatic.
“Whenever I have free time, I turn it on and let the device play passively. This makes my social media usage time quite high.”
She ties that to the algorithm itself. “One reason people find it hard to disconnect from social media to do other things is partly due to the platforms' algorithms, especially when browsing short videos. This makes it difficult to control the scrolling. Many times, I'm very tired, but my hands still keep scrolling, almost instinctively” she said.
Nghiem Manh Duc Sees Both Sides
Nghiem Manh Duc describes a similar split. He says social media has given him “a lot of new insights into the world” that he did not have time to catch up on through other media.
He also says the control cuts both ways. He sometimes cannot control the time and content he consumes, and he has sacrificed some study and work time because of it.
The pattern fits the broader tension in Gen Z use: access, speed, and variety on one side; lost focus and lost hours on the other. A related view of media pressure and personal habit appears in this look at addiction battles, which tracks how screen habits can shape daily choices.
Nguyen Van Sang Finds Opportunity
Nguyen Van Sang, a student majoring in Primary Education at the University of Education, Da Nang University, says social media helped him bridge the gap between his hometown opportunities and those of peers in the city.
“I used to think that geographical distance would give me fewer opportunities than my peers in the city. But social media has helped me bridge that gap considerably. I can access new knowledge, learn from talented people, and connect with communities that I previously had little chance of meeting,” he said.
He also says TikTok gave him the opportunity to earn extra income and pushed him to learn how to film, edit, write content, tell short stories, and communicate with the community.
The trade-off is clear in the three stories: social media can widen access to information and work, but the same feed can pull students past the point where they still control their time. For Gen Z, the urgent issue is not whether to log on, but how to stop before the app takes the whole evening.
