San Diego hosts phone-free dinners to counter screen fatigue

Fourteen single adults gathered at a restaurant in La Jolla on a midsummer evening, arriving dressed for a night out but leaving their smartphones behind. The group participated in the Ember Supper Club, a dining event series designed to facilitate face-to-face networking without the mediation of dating applications. Marie McGovern and Gracie Alzate founded the club in 2024 to provide a social alternative to online platforms.

McGovern, who has a background in event planning and marketing, said she wanted to find a way to meet people in person that was not reliant on the online dating scene. She described the goal as creating a community centered on good food, good drinks, and great ambience. The event targets a growing demographic that finds digital interaction overwhelming.

A 2025 survey by The Harris Poll for Quad found that 81% of Gen Z adults and 78% of millennials often wish they could disconnect from digital devices more easily. Eshin Jolly, a computational social neuroscience researcher at UC San Diego, calls the human desire for this type of connection social nourishment. He noted that the need to belong is often not satisfied online, but in-person interaction provides the opportunity to fulfill it.

Jolly explained that social nourishment comes from the rich information exchanged during face-to-face contact, including words, expressions, and small signals. The U.S. Surgeon General's Advisory on Social Connection and Community reported that Americans spend an average of six hours a day on digital media. One in three U.S. adults said they are online almost constantly, a figure that has doubled among teenagers since 2015.

Beyond one-on-one connections, people are seeking group experiences with shared interests. In May, Future Is Color held a listening room experience at the La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art where attendees listened to vinyl records in a living-room setting. Founder Erwin Hines described the event as a form of cultural liberation, noting that music creates a unified environment where attention is focused on the same thing.

Hines said music has historically been a way for Black Americans to hold, carry, and pass stories to the next generation, often containing coded resistance. One attendee in the listening room said she was looking for a space to pause and have conversations around music and culture. She appreciated the phone-free environment that allowed for deep listening.

Jolly said many people are trying to nourish their need for connection first and then let social technology play a different role in their lives. These gatherings are often organized and discovered through the very phones participants are trying to step away from.