Americans spend an average of more than four hours a day on their smartphones—and it’s hardly innocent fun. A new study finds that smartphone addiction can have the same effect on the brain as drug addiction, reducing gray matter and delivering a dopamine rush that’s even likened to the high of snorting cocaine. For artist Joe Hollier, it took just one stint working in an experimental program at Google—where he was tasked to conceive the very apps designed to keep users glued to their screens—to convince him to take an about-face approach to tech. “I kind of said, well, geez, could being any more connected to my smartphone for another two hours a day be what I actually need,” he recalls, “or am I constantly craving escape and wishing I lived in a van off the grid?”