I have ADHD – consciously/executively directing attention is intrinsically hard for me. I remember the arrival of infinite scroll as a website pattern – I suddenly found it much harder to tear myself away from the exact same websites (Reddit, Twitter, Imgur). The page breaks that allowed me to think ‘okay, let’s not read page 21’ were gone. I would just keep scrolling, keep reading, and wake up sleep-deprived the next morning. I remember thinking “this is awful, I wish I could turn off that infinite scroll. Tonight I must stop earlier, for sure.” Or on some sites I wouldn’t realise there was infinite scroll; think ‘I’m nearly at the bottom’ and I wouldn’t realise new content kept getting loaded below my screen
Infinite scroll makes nobody’s life better, and makes my life worse by trying to prevent me from redirecting my attention. It fucks up my coping strategies. If you, reader, are ever asked to implement infinite scroll – fucking please don’t do it. Make a way to turn it off. Convince the requester not to do it. Outright refuse to do it. Please.
I have ADHD – consciously/executively directing attention is intrinsically hard for me. I remember the arrival of infinite scroll as a website pattern – I suddenly found it much harder to tear myself away from the exact same websites (Reddit, Twitter, Imgur). The page breaks that allowed me to think ‘okay, let’s not read page 21’ were gone. I would just keep scrolling, keep reading, and wake up sleep-deprived the next morning. I remember thinking “this is awful, I wish I could turn off that infinite scroll. Tonight I must stop earlier, for sure.” Or on some sites I wouldn’t realise there was infinite scroll; think ‘I’m nearly at the bottom’ and I wouldn’t realise new content kept getting loaded below my screen
Infinite scroll makes nobody’s life better, and makes my life worse by trying to prevent me from redirecting my attention. It fucks up my coping strategies. If you, reader, are ever asked to implement infinite scroll – fucking please don’t do it. Make a way to turn it off. Convince the requester not to do it. Outright refuse to do it. Please.