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Authored by: ADAA member Bonnie Zucker, PhD - Shared by permission from Psychology Today.
Is too much information a bad thing? When it comes to anxiety, the flood of information that we can now get from technology is problematic.
In fact, one study found a significant increase in anxiety disorders when comparing anxiety prevalence rates during the period of 2007-2009 to that of 2019-2022 (Gkitakou et al., 2025).
Although there are many factors that could contribute to this increase in anxiety disorders, keep in mind that the iPhone was released in 2007, and it took a couple of years for smartphones to become ubiquitous.
Some of the more obvious reasons for an increase in anxiety include the often-upsetting news alerts that pop up on our phones when we least expect them, and the way social media has been detrimental to our health, especially that of teenage girls.
Technology and Intolerance of Uncertainty
Another angle that I see as particularly problematic and directly relating to our increases in anxiety is that technology has eroded our ability to tolerate uncertainty. Intolerance of uncertainty is often seen as a hallmark characteristic of most, if not all, of the anxiety disorders.
Here are some examples of people who struggle with uncertainty and how they rely on technology:
- Michael, a middle-aged man with generalized anxiety disorder, constantly worries about his finances and checks his bank accounts multiple times a day to give himself reassurance that everything is OK.
- Kaia, a new mother with OCD symptoms, finds that she is not sleeping much because she is glued to her video baby monitor to make sure her baby is still breathing.
- Tysen, a law student who lost his father at a young age to a heart attack, finds that he is now having panic attacks, thinking he too is dying of a heart attack. To try to quell his anxiety, he frequently uses the heart rate function on his watch.
- Chris, a self-proclaimed hypochondriac, has graduated from Google to AI and asks it about every unusual body symptom they experience.
- McKenzie knows where her college student daughters are at all times, thanks to Life360 (even though they are both out of state). Of note, her daughters text her throughout the day, frequently seeking her advice or emotional support.
Back in the Old Days
Before we had this level of access, thanks to technology, we often would have to sit with our anxious feelings when something uncertain arose. People would still feel anxious and maybe would engage in other unhelpful behaviors to reduce this uncertainty. However, it wasn’t as easy as it is today.
One of the keys to overcoming anxiety is allowing it to be there, not seeking reassurance from an external source, and learning that it will decrease naturally. The more someone can do that, the better off they will be in the long run.
Resisting Reassurance vs. Giving Into It
For example, the gold standard of treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder is called exposure and response prevention. Let’s say that someone has obsessions about germs or dirt. As part of the treatment, they might do something to “contaminate” themselves, such as touching a doorknob or the bottom of their shoe and then resist performing the compulsion (washing their hands). Although very anxiety-producing, through multiple practices, they learn that there is nothing to fear, and their anxiety becomes more manageable and decreases over time.
On the other hand, a person with health anxiety who consults ChatGPT multiple times a day about health symptoms does not learn how to cope with the uncertainty of not knowing something. Their anxiety might come down when they check something with AI, but as soon as anxiety returns, they will go back to this same behavior, keeping them in the anxiety and reassurance cycle. In fact, many people will describe their reliance on tech like an addiction.
Breaking Your Reliance on Tech
Here are a few steps to reduce your reliance on tech and help manage your anxiety in the long term.
Step 1. Assess your technology use, as it relates to anxiety. For the next week, make a list of when you use tech to quell anxiety or reduce your discomfort with uncertainty.
Step 2. Examine the items on the list. Are there any areas where you could reduce your tech use? It’s often easiest to start resisting with something that causes low to moderate anxiety.
Step 3. Set some goals to begin. For example:
- I will wait five minutes before asking AI about a body symptom. (This amount of time can slowly be increased.)
- I will go from checking my bank account twice a day to only checking three times a week.
- I will stop wearing my watch because the urge to monitor my heart rate is too great. The doctor never told me I needed to do this.
Step 4. Re-evaluate your goals. Celebrate the successes. When you couldn’t reach a goal, consider making a new, more realistic goal. Or, figure out what got in your way.
When Your Anxiety Feels Out of Control
Not everyone can do this work on their own. Consider finding the help of a therapist if you feel like you can’t get a handle on your anxiety, especially when it comes to the use of technology. It can feel so hard to resist the urge to seek reassurance when the answer is as close as being in your pocket.
Key points
- Anxiety disorders have been on the rise over the past 20 years.
- The proliferation of technology has likely contributed to this increase in anxiety.
Technology gives access to too much information, making us unable to tolerate uncertainty.
Check out Dr.Zucker's May 2026 New Release Freedom from Panic: Evidence-Based Techniques to End Avoidance and Stop Panic Before It Stops You
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