Today, my girlfriend told me that she hasn't been able to calm down in the past few days. I analyzed whether it was because of the hot weather or lack of sleep, but she said it wasn't. Then she thought about it for a while and told me that it might be because she has been consuming too much information recently, especially the hot topics and various information on Weibo and other social media platforms, which has caused her psychological anxiety. She said she wants to quit the internet.
Immediately, I remembered an article I read on GoodRx Health titled "Doomscrolling: Why Too Much News Can Be Bad for Your Mental Health." Why is too much news detrimental to our mental health?
The source of anxiety
Keeping up with news and current events can help broaden our horizons, increase knowledge, and keep us engaged and informed about social trends. However, news can also have positive and negative aspects. Negative news often brings us more stress.
One of the influencing factors is negativity bias. Negativity bias refers to the tendency for people to pay more attention to negative events or information and ignore positive or optimistic content. This bias can be seen as a protective mechanism.
The impact of excessive news consumption
The impacts are evident.
Physically, it can cause headaches, fatigue, weight changes, sexual problems, and over time, it can lead to hypertension, heart disease, diabetes, and other illnesses.
Psychologically, it commonly increases stress, depression, anxiety, PTSD, and more.
Further thoughts
I'm thinking that it's not just news, but any information posted by internet users can potentially cause psychological anxiety.
In recent years, with the rise of social media platforms, everyone can express their opinions online. Taking Sina Weibo as an example, spreading rumors to create gender conflicts, exaggerating the normal private lives of celebrities, becoming "keyboard warriors" and cyberbullying others... If the platform is not well regulated, it will only exacerbate social conflicts and lead to conflicts.
A few days ago, China's Cyberspace Administration released a notice on strengthening the management of "self-media," requiring enhanced management of information authenticity and standardized labeling of information sources. Sometimes, the spread of false information can have immeasurable impacts, and debunking rumors often requires great effort.
While the quality of information is mixed, there are ways to filter and screen information.
Filtering and screening information
The aforementioned article also mentions how to establish a healthy relationship with news information.
- Add more good news. Actively pay attention to positive news, and if you come across content that makes you uncomfortable, close it decisively.
- Limit your time. Control the time you spend on social media platforms each day, like my girlfriend mentioned at the beginning that she wants to quit the internet.
- Limit your sources.
Speaking of limiting sources, I have to mention RSS.
By using RSS, we can actively obtain information that interests us and exclude content that we dislike or are not interested in. Although it is not very popular at the moment, my understanding is to reject algorithms and actively seek information. Even if you don't understand RSS, it's okay as long as you understand this point.
Learn to think independently. I think the popularity of short videos has gradually caused people to lose the ability to think independently.
A recent case that has received a lot of attention is the case of privately building a floating bridge. There are various opinions online, some supporting the court's verdict, and some supporting the villager Huang who built the bridge. At first, I read an article by Luo Xiang titled "Is It Guilty to Privately Build a Floating Bridge?" and thought the analysis was reasonable, and the truth might be like that. But as I saw more and more reports, from various aspects and more comprehensive coverage, the situation became more complex, far from being as simple as we imagined.
I believe that we should not easily draw conclusions about things, nor should we judge based solely on one person or one aspect. We should think and analyze more. The world is too complex, and people are even more complex.
Finally, it's better to spend less time online and read more books.