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Why every year-but especially 2020-feels like the worst ever
Our addiction to bad news
If every year feels like the worst, it's mostly because our brains tend to judge the present more harshly. Indiscriminately watching the news skews our perception and makes us more prone to slip into unhealthy patterns.
Many of us become obsessed with the world's seemingly increasing danger. We can't stop checking narratives of the deadly diseases, police brutality, protests, conspiracy theories, and politics, even if it is halfway around the world.
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Our addiction to bad news
If every year feels like the worst, it's mostly because our brains tend to judge the present more harshly. Indiscriminately watching the news skews our perception and makes us more prone to slip into unhealthy patterns.
Many of us become obsessed with the world's seemingly increasing danger. We can't stop checking narratives of the deadly diseases, police brutality, protests, conspiracy theories, and politics, even if it is halfway around the world.
Our negative interpretation of current events
In Western culture, people tend to interpret current events negatively, while we tend to remember the positive experiences of the past.
Frightening things have happened in the past too and before the current pandemic, the majority of Americans already believed the country was going downhill.
Doomscrolling and social media
- According to a 2017 survey, respondents who consumed excessive news reported lost sleep, stress, anxiety, and fatigue.
- In 1968, a study found a direct correlation between time spent watching television and the likelihood that the watcher will perceive the world more dangerous. Viewers who watch violent television shows generally believe violence is common in reality.
However, the effects of media aren't always negative. It depends on the medium of consumption and how you use it. Actively engaging in positive conversations with friends and family can have a positive effect. Lurking or scrolling through updates without engaging has a negative psychological impact.
Controlling our biases towards the present
While we may never see the present as perfect, we can learn to control our biases.
- Acknowledge how the media shifts our perceptions. It can make the present look worse than in the past.
- Take a realistic view of history and compare it with the present.
- Take stock in what we do have. We are making progress socially and scientifically, a feat that would have been impossible a hundred years ago.
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The story behind a physical item we own matters
Assigning luck to an object
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- Through symbolism: Like a sock with four-leaf clovers or black cats printed on them.
- Magical contagion: The idea that there is some essence or physical property that can rub off from contacting it.
Bad associations
According to research, secondhand engagement rings are much less likely to sell if the listing indicated that the previous owner had been through a divorce or a broken engagement. One explanation is that we believe that various properties can be transmitted through contact.
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Precrastination
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How to avoid ‘precrastination’
- Ask yourself if a task can benefit from added time. Those that require creativity, thoughtfulness, or emotion will need a slower response.
- Identify the tasks you can rush through.
- Keep a calendar and to-do list. Externalizing what's cluttering your mind will leave you with energy to channel elsewhere.
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They may boost our attention span, calm our anxiety and promote pain relief, although evidence is still insufficient. Studies showed that the effects increased the longer people listened.
But whatever mechanism is creating these changes remains unknown.
How binaural beats work
You can hear these beats best with a pair of good headphones. When each ear picks up a slightly different pitch, the brain tries to compensate and finds a frequency somewhere in the middle. This supposedly causes both hemispheres of the brain to harmonize their brainwaves, a phenomenon called neural entrainment.
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