Short-form content platforms like TikTok are routinely accused of rotting brains, ruining productivity and damaging societies. Cambridge students, often romanticised as stoic scholars sealed away within libraries, are not immune; yet their relationship with these platforms is markedly complex.

In speaking to over 40 students from across a wide range of years and colleges, I gathered a reasonably representative snapshot of how TikTok usage manifests across Cambridge. The findings illuminate not merely a source of mindless entertainment but a contested space of distraction, identity, coping, and self-surveillance.

“The findings illuminate not merely a source of mindless entertainment, but a contested space of distraction, identity, coping, and self-surveillance.”

Despite the initial eyerolls when the platform re-launched in 2016, TikTok has very much cemented its place as the couture of tailored algorithms over the last nine years. Engineered for instant appeal, stitched in short-term retention, it has developed well beyond a passing craze: for many, it is a ritual. The most common level of usage was “a few times a day,” selected by 14 respondents, suggesting habitual and embedded engagement rather than sporadic use. Meanwhile, a significant minority – nearly half the sample – reported using the app rarely or not at all.

When asked how their usage had changed since arriving, seven students reported a slight decrease, and five indicated a significant decrease, while others admitted their use had increased. For some, TikTok served as a balm to the stresses of term-time; for others, it had become untenable, wiped out entirely in the name of mental clarity. “I used to be addicted […] it was negatively affecting my mental health… I haven’t regretted deleting it at all,” one student reflected.

“I used to be addicted […] it was negatively affecting my mental health […] I haven’t regretted deleting it at all,” one student reflected.”

Another articulated a platform whack-a-mole familiar to many: deleting TikTok, migrating to Instagram Reels, then returning to TikTok when the detox became too inconvenient. This baseline impulse towards smartphoneable dopamine, for many, never quite disappears; it simply finds new forms.

This emotional entanglement is mirrored in students’ assessments of TikTok’s role in academic stress. While three respondents praised the platform as a significant source of decompression, more frequently, students described it as a mixed blessing. The most common answer to the question of how TikTok affects stress was “hinders somewhat,” a response selected by over a third of users. The tension lies less in the app itself and more in the way it’s used: whether as a short break or a long delay, a dopamine hit or a cognitive drain. The app appears more like a psychological companion than a passive pastime.

This is further reflected in how students characterise their own relationship to the app. Only a very small number described their usage as “entirely controlled.” The vast majority fell into the “mostly controlled” or “somewhat compulsive” categories, with a significant subset admitting to a “highly compulsive” dynamic, a finding that echoes broader concerns around the addictive design of short-form video platforms.

When asked about when they most often scroll, the results were telling. The most common contexts were “when bored or unoccupied,” “while procrastinating on something important,” and “when feeling stressed or overwhelmed.” TikTok is not merely something students do. Rather, it’s something they reach for in moments of vulnerability or distraction. The platform becomes less of an entertainment tool and more of a barometer of emotional and cognitive states.

“TikTok is not merely something students do. Rather, it’s something they reach for in moments of vulnerability or distraction.”

Meanwhile, the question of whether TikTok content reflects students’ academic lives produced a revealing split. While a handful noted that their feeds were full of productivity content and study memes, the majority of users, even those who use the app frequently, reported that their feeds had little to no relation to academic life.

And when the algorithm does surface study content, the effects are far from benign. A majority of students engaging with productivity TikToks reported that these clips made them feel guilty, rather than motivated. Multiple users chose the dual-option: “both motivate me and make me feel guilty.”

In a university already synonymous with impostor syndrome and perfectionism, TikTok appears to refract these anxieties rather than relieve them. As delightful as Jack Edwards may be, this kind of content offers not just entertainment, but a curated hall of mirrors: a stream of twenty-somethings lighting candles beside colour-coded flashcards, performing the very focus the viewer may be struggling to attain.

Yet there is something refreshingly honest in the way Cambridge students spoke about their usage. Students are not naive to the platform’s pull, nor are they entirely beholden to it. A generation finely attuned to the contradictions of their digital environments, grappling earnestly with how to live alongside the very technologies designed to dominate their attention.

And perhaps that’s the overarching point. Not TikTok cast as a singular villain (contrary to what the revolving door of This Morning naysayers will tell you), nor students as helpless scrollers, but as a pattern of stress and strategy, self-regulation and surrender, playing out in the quiet gaps of the day. For all the app’s absurdities, it continues to hold a mirror to how students work, rest, and relate. Far from ‘just another algorithm,’ it seems that the platform is moving towards something more resemblant of an anthropology in motion.