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“I definitely don’t follow the news anymore,” one patient told me when I asked her about her consumption of political news in the weeks leading up to the 2024 US presidential election.
This conversation occurred around the time I spoke to a local TV station about why we watched fewer political signs in the yard during this year’s election season, compared to previous ones.
I am a psychiatrist who studies and treats fear and anxiety. One of my top mental health recommendations to my patients during the 2016 and 2020 election cycles was to reduce their consumption of political news. I also tried to convince them that the five hours a day they spent watching cable news only left them helpless and terrified.
However, in recent years I have noticed a change: Many of my patients say they have become disengaged or too tired to do more than a brief read of political news or watch an hour of their favorite political show.
Research supports my clinical experience: A bench research study 2020 showed that 66% of Americans were exhausted by political stress. Interestingly, those who don’t follow the news feel the same fatigue at an even higher rate at 73%. In 20238 in 10 Americans described American politics with negative words such as “divisive,” “corrupt,” “disordered,” and “polarized.”
In my opinion, three main factors have led Americans to exhaustion and exhaustion of American politics.
1. The politics of fear
In my 2023 book, “FEAR: Understand the purpose of fear and harness the power of anxiety.”I talk about how American politicians and the mainstream media have found an ally in fear: a very strong emotion that can be used to capture our attention, keeping us along tribal lines and making us follow, click, tap, watch and donate.
In recent decades, many people have felt a strong push toward tribalism, an “us versus them” way of seeing the world that pits Americans against each other. This has led to a point where we are not just at odds with each other. we hatecancel, block and attack those who disagree with us.
2. People live in information bubbles.
It may seem as if commentators on Fox News and MSNBC are talking about America from two different planets. The same goes when it comes to different social media feeds.
Many people are part of social media communities that are closed to the world outside their homes and familiar social circles. Depending on people’s political views and what they search, watch and read, Social media algorithms provide them with content. where everyone speaks and thinks the same. If you hear about the other side, it’s only about their worst attributes and behavior.
The disconnection is so vast that people are not even able to understand the Thinking about those from other perspectives. and they find his logic or political beliefs unfathomable.
Many Americans have come to the point of believing that the other half of Americans, at best, unintelligent and stupid; and at worst, immoral and evil..
3. People’s political opinions have become their identities.
There was a time in American politics where two politicians or two neighbors could disagree but still believe the other person was fundamentally good.
Over time, and more since the early 2000sthis ability to connect despite political beliefs has diminished.
Majorities of Democrats and Republicans said in a 2022 Pew Research survey that someone’s political beliefs are an indicator of their morality and character.
This 2022 Pew survey also shows that partisan animosity extends to judgments about character: 72% of Republicans and 63% of Democrats said they believe members of the opposing party are more “immoral” than other Americans .
This is evident in the everyday conversations of members of both political tribes: “How can I be friends with someone who wants to kill babies?” or “How can I talk to someone who is okay with women dying on a street corner?” the parking lot of a clinic.” We can no longer see someone’s political affiliation in the context of their overall humanity.
What psychology and neuroscience say
Fear as a deeply ingrained survival mechanism it takes priority over other brain functions.
Fear guides your memories, feelings, attention, and thoughts, and can keep you looking, scrolling, and reading to monitor this perceived threat. Positive or neutral news may become uninteresting because it is not important in your survival response. That has been the key to one person’s deep commitment to fear-based political news.
But too much fear doesn’t keep someone committed forever. This is due to another survival mechanism: what is called “learned helplessness.”
In 1967, the American psychologist Martin Seligman two groups of dogs exposed to painful shocks. The dogs in group 1 could stop the shock by pressing a lever, which they quickly learned to do. But the dogs in group 2 learned that they couldn’t control when the shock begins and ends.
Both groups were then placed in a box divided into two halves by a small barrier, and electric shock was applied to only one side of the box. The dogs in group 1, which had learned to stop the shocks in the previous experiment, quickly learned to jump over the barrier to the shock-free side. But the dogs in group 2 didn’t even try to do it. They had learned that there is no point in trying.
This experiment has been replicated in different ways with other animals and humans with the same conclusion: when people feel that they cannot control the painful or scary situation, they simply give up. During such experiences, the brain region of fear – called the amygdala – is hyperactive. Meanwhile, brain areas that regulate emotions, such as the prefrontal cortex, decrease their activity in these circumstances.
Learned helplessness also means that brain mechanisms commonly involved in regulating anxiety and depression don’t work as well.
When I work with patients who have suffered long periods of intense anxiety, fear, trauma, and exhaustion, I see learned helplessness manifest as depression, loss of motivation, fatigue, and disengagement with the world around them.
The COVID-19 pandemic, more than a decade of intense political tension, social media polarization and wars around the world, as well as public disillusionment with American politics and media, have led, I believe, to many people experiencing burnout and learned helplessness.
If you feel politically exhausted, you are not the problem. Feel free to tune out the noise.
This article is republished in part from The conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
