A check-in app that interrupts the scroll to ask one honest question and what nine people taught us when we put it in front of them.
“Was It Worth It?” is a mobile check-in app that interrupts a person's social media scrolling session and asks them to reflect on how the session made them feel. Rather than simply blocking apps after a time limit, it prompts a quick “was it worth it?” notification and logs the response. These responses turn those check-ins into weekly reflections so people can see which platforms tend to leave them feeling worse.
Designed to combat doomscrolling, the application halts users mid-scroll to prompt emotional reflection. By utilizing intrusive notifications and providing concrete usage and reflection data, it offers clear insights into their actions. Confronting the negative emotions that arise from scrolling ultimately enables users to change their habits.
Primary audience: young adults, 18–28, largely college students and early-career professionals the group with the highest reported daily usage and the most on the line when scrolling collides with a deadline or a night's sleep.
Constraints: tested against a deliberately wide age range (24–70) beyond that primary audience, to stress-test the concept against more than one relationship to social media.
The objective of of testing was to measure, quantitatively, users could complete the app's core flows without guidance. These users would respond to a check-in interruption, logging how a scrolling session felt, adjusting the time-limit setting, reading their own reflection data, and configuring which platforms are tracked.
This study combined moderated and unmoderated usability testing methods. For the moderated sessions, six participants were provided a printed sheet with scenarios and used the Figma prototype on a mobile device while being recorded. For the unmoderated testing, three participants completed the evaluation remotely using shared links. Participants in both study groups completed pre- and post-test questionnaires to evaluate the prevalence of the problem and assess how effectively the application fits into their daily routines.
Research methods:
The visual redesign leans into four colors. Deep olive for focus and sage for gentle affirmation, warm tan for structure, and cream for a screen that reads as a pause rather than another feed to consume.
A serif display face carries the moments that need warmth headlines, the confirmation screen, the reflection prompt
Each participant stepped into a short scenario, then attempted the task cold.
Each Page type was planned out to better understand the workflow.
Before touching the prototype, participants confirmed the problem was real. After using it, the picture got more complicated.
Five testers walked through hand-drawn screens on index cards before a single pixel was designed cheap enough to throw away, real enough to expose problems early.
What informal testing found
Five testers walked through hand-drawn screens on index cards before a single pixel was designed cheap enough to throw away, real enough to expose problems early.
| Task | Avg. time |
|---|---|
| 1. Answer Interruption | 1:11 |
| 2. Log Scrolling Session | 1:32 |
| 3. Change Timer | 1:07 |
| 3. Reflection | 0:56 |
| 3. Control Permissions | 0:58 |
| Total per tester | 5:44 |
All three findings trace back to the same root cause: the prototype asks people to reflect, but doesn't yet give them a stable, legible place to do it.
Task 4 asked participants to find which platform left them feeling worst. Just 43% picked correctly the layout's visual hierarchy pointed people toward the opposite conclusion the data actually supported, and there was no confirming state once they'd "finished" the task.
The absence of clear orientation markers or a "home" state meant users defaulted to revisiting previous screens in an attempt to reset or find an exit, resulting in the observed circular navigation patterns. Task 2 logging how a session felt took the longest of any task on average, largely because it was most people's first real encounter with the flow.
Task 1 simulated an active interruption mid-feed within a social media environment, whereas Task 2 required launching the check-in directly from the standalone application after closing a platform. Participants repeatedly failed to distinguish between these entry points due to visual and structural ambiguities across the two interface flows.
| Finding | Recommendation |
|---|---|
| Reflections is unreadable | Reformat the Reflections page to prioritize actionable insights, simplify data visualization to show clear platform comparisons. Add prominent navigation buttons to improve discoverability. |
| Users get stuck looping between the same 2–3 screens | Implement clear success/confirmation states and persistent exit buttons on every screen to prevent users from getting stuck in navigation loops. |
| Visual miscommunication first two tasks | Introduce distinct visual cues for the different entry points to reduce user confusion regarding task context. |
Older participants pushed back on the framing. Their doomscrolling wasn't TikTok it was news sites and the links that follow them out of an email inbox. The underlying pattern, an algorithm-shaped absence of a stopping point, isn't unique to social platforms. It suggests the eventual scope of the tool may need to widen past the apps it started with.
Only 28.6% of participants thought a repeated "was it worth it?" prompt would change their behavior over time most expected to eventually dismiss it like any other notification, and several said it felt more like guilt than guidance. And yet every single participant admitted social media keeps them scrolling longer than they mean to. The demand for the tool is real; the current delivery of the question isn't yet landing the way it's meant to.
"Was It Worth It?" usability study reveals a clear demand for screen-time management tools, but highlights critical friction points within the current prototype. While participants recognize the value of the app's intent, the core navigation loops and confusing interface elements hinder the user experience. To drive long-term adoption and shift user behavior effectively, future iterations must prioritize interface clarity and workflow efficiency.