Each day, the average person spends about 108 minutes scrolling on social media. In that time, one’s thumb travels approximately 38,880 centimeters, roughly the height of the Empire State Building.
In our digital age, many of us succumb to the modern malaise of “doomscrolling.” A term that emerged during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, doomscrolling describes the compulsive activity of pursuing negative news online. This behavior can leave us more fearful than informed and may be detrimental to our health.
Negativity Incentivized
Anxiety and fear direct our attention. Media leverages these emotions to drive consumption. An analysis published in 2023 in Nature Human Behaviour demonstrated that headlines with negative words were directly correlated to increased open rates. The researchers determined that each additional negative word increased the click-through rate by 2.3 percent.
