What is Doomscrolling and how to avoid it?

Have you ever heard about "going down the rabbit hole"? Doomscrolling or Doomsurfing is the internet lingo used to describe the process of chasing bad news and reading about it obsessively. Merriam Websters defines doomscrolling as "Tendency to continue to surf or scroll through bad news, even though that news is saddening, disheartening, or depressing."

Bad news isn't in short supply right now. We can find tons of bad news, like people getting infected from coronavirus, many of them dying, economy going into a recession, people losing their jobs, and so on. All the bad news tends to surface into our news feed in the age of social media on a daily basis. We start to read any of the bad news and then gets sucked up into a pool of depressing news, before we know it, negativity creeps in, not to mention the time that gets wasted. With people staying home most of the time due to coronavirus, screen time has increased sharply and the tendency to doomscroll as well. Some estimates say, our screen time has gone up as much as 50%.

Doomscolling isn't a new phenomenon, it has always been there but coronavirus has put the term right into our daily lingo. It is very common for people to be attracted to bad news. As humans, we have a tendency for self-preservation, this leads us getting really intrigued by anything which might harm us. This self-preservation reflex leads us into information gathering about the potential cause and source of harm. Thus, we keep reading about all kind bad news, thinking this might land at our door as well.

While we think that this information gathering is empowering us into a sense of control, it is far from truth. It does not instil any control, rather it makes us more anxious, sad and depressed. Not only it takes our mind off of positive things happening around us, it also puts us into an eco-chamber of negativity. It can put serious strain on our mental and physical well-being, while also making us socially inactive.

It is a little difficult to avoid this habit right now considering the social distancing and stay at home orders from the authorities but there are ways in which we can significantly reduce the amount of bad news we consume and the screen time we are exposed to. 

The first step starts with the admission that we are doomscrolling. We must be able to map out our daily consumption of information and screen time. Fortunately, smartphones these days provide this data on a daily basis. Once we have admitted that we are doomscrolling, the next step is to plan out a schedule. Assign proper timing for news consumption and break the cycle of continuously scrolling through the news. Once we have a proper schedule, we can use the saved time into other productive and positive activities.

Indulge into learning activities. The time is great to learn something new and add on to your skill set. There are many ways you can learn new skills; this can be self-learning or via online classes. This will not only help you in taking your mind off that depressing news but will add something important to your skill set that can help you in post coronavirus world.

Meditation is a great way to reduce anxiety and calm your mind, while dragging you away from the habit of doomscrolling. It will rid your mind of the unnecessary negativity that has already crept in while enthusing a sense of well-being and positivity.

Create a support group or get in touch with your own social group 'virtually'. Talk to them, try to be of emotional help to each other and find ways of sharing positive experiences. Stay in touch with friends, try to find the whereabouts of old friends that you have lost touch with. Spend more time with your family, talk to them, listen to them; because we are not sure if we will get so much time again once life comes to normal.

Conclusion:

Doomscrolling is the habit of continuously and obsessively scrolling and reading bad news. While the habit has been around for ages, coronavirus pandemic has brought the spotlight on it like never before. This habit not only creates a sense of negativity in our mind but can also be detrimental for our mental and physical well-being. We should try and limit ourselves from doomscrolling and follow a schedule where we can read news for a limited period and use more time in activities like learning new skills, meditation, getting in touch with friends and family and spending time in activities that brings happiness and positivity.