I very much agree that learning is not a slog, and its sad that people are educated in ways that leaves them believing that learning has to be a slog.
Where I disagree with you is that I do think it is true that some things are addictive and are designed to be addictive (social media is), but its the things people do on devices that are addictive, not the devices themselves.
I agree "dopamine release" is not a bad thing per se, but when businesses hire psychologists to figure out how to get people to spend more time on their app people are being manipulated in a disturbing way.
One point about manipulative attempts to increase engagement is that they only have to apply statistically, that is, increase total engagement. Another point is that people just enjoy doing dumb things to relax. It's then offensive (to me, too!) that businesses exploit this to promote things. But it's not disturbing if somebody is really into, say, jigsaw puzzles. We don't claim Ravensburger is hacking people's brains with their carefully designed colorful and complex pictures that draw you in and keep you playing. That's because Ravensburger are not a bunch of sinister jerks, which is the real issue. But the brain-hacking capacity of infinite phone videos isn't any more real than that of the jigsaws.
Where I disagree with you is that I do think it is true that some things are addictive and are designed to be addictive (social media is), but its the things people do on devices that are addictive, not the devices themselves.
I agree "dopamine release" is not a bad thing per se, but when businesses hire psychologists to figure out how to get people to spend more time on their app people are being manipulated in a disturbing way.
Edit - inserted missing "not"