Living in Constant Crisis Mode |
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Frightening and distressing content captures our attention.
Ultimately, having our attention on distressing things we can't control makes us anxious and depressed.
We have a choice as to where we focus our attention and how we think about issues.
These choices are key to our well-being and positive engagement with our world.
Today’s news is always breaking and almost always bad. Threat, urgency, crisis, divisiveness, and helplessness are all amplified.
Meanwhile, psychological research suggests that constant exposure to negative news distorts perception, harms mental health, and undermines our experience of agency. Ultimately, our emotional attention is a choice, not an obligation, and a selective, grounded focus can help us maintain a healthy perspective and an effective life stance.
If It Bleeds, It Leads
Most people have heard the aphorism: “If it bleeds, it leads.” There’s a reason why news is structurally skewed towards the negative: Emotionally activating content captures our attention and the news wants our attention.
Large-scale studies have shown that emotionally negative content is more likely to spread on newsfeeds. This is because our brains are wired to respond to threats more than to neutral or positive stimuli. It makes sense why this would be so–it could be crucial to our survival........