New York City, NY.- You will have noticed more people, on their cell phone or with their finger sliding up. Yes, users of the famous social network Tik Tok
And it is that today it is common to find people on the street recording dances, challenges or broadcasting live for this application.
¨I will only do business on Tik Tok more than on other platforms,¨ said Shina, a fitness instructor we found in Sunset Park in Brooklyn giving classes on Tik Tok. ¨It is broader, you can reach anyone in the world, faster¨.
Tik Tok has more than 1.5 billion users in the world, more than 80 million active in the United States. More than half of its users are young people under 29 years of age. 32% are adolescents between 10 – 19 years old and 29% between 20 and 29.
Young people spend about two hours a day on Tik Tok
Alan Alonso says that on average he uses this application between 3 and 4 hours a day. Curiously, we found him in the park with his friends and they were all on his phones.
“In the morning I check the weather, then I go to Tik Tok, then again at school,” Alan said. ¨If I’m bored, I have nothing to do, 4 hours on the phone doing nothing.¨
Alan started Tik Tok a year ago because all his friends from High School used the social network. He likes this app because the algorithm allows him to watch unlimited video gaming or skateboarding uploaded by people outside of his network.
“He has videos for you like things you like, your likes,” Alan said.
But even young people form their ideas or get information through this network.
¨I see information from Tik Tok and then I go to safari to see what is happening in the world. It depends on what you see is how you are going to see the world¨, said Alan.
Pandemic boosted reach of Tik Tok
Specialists say that this application, which in 2026 could surpass Facebook as the social network with the most users, became so addictive in part due to the lack of socialization during the pandemic.
¨The brain, when we nourish it with pleasant things, pleasant things; he insists on staying there”, said Juan Carlos Dumas, a clinical psychologist. ¨That brain cannot be taking all the information from a virtual method.¨
Dr. Dumas says he has several parents who tell him they are worried about their children, especially the number of hours they spend on Tik Tok.
“Adolescents generally lack strong common sense, common sense is forming,” Dumas added.
Physical disorders such as seizures and tics
But the addition to this social network could also have damage, not only a lack of attention or socialization. Specialists discovered increased or greater awareness of young people with Tourette syndrome, a disorder that can cause tics in young people and even seizures.
We searched for the word tic in the app and found many videos of young people sharing their episodes.
Some specialists think that this exaggerated exposure of Tik Tok and seeing so many episodes of other people with the symptom has increased the frequency and has created atypical cases of this disorder.
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