Is negative news depleting your positivity

image courtesy of shutterstock.com

How much of your current view of the world, humanity and your future is being shaped by negative news?

One of my go-to blog sites is Positive Psychology News because they provide great articles with the latest scientific research into what impacts our potential to live more happy, flourishing, meaningful and prosperous lives.

This post from Henry Edwards explores the negative consequences we can experience from being constantly fed negatively biased news through mainstream media.

I grew up in an era where it was habitual for us to sit together as a family at 6:00pm to watch the nightly TV news, and then we would move from the lounge to the dining table to eat a family meal and discuss the news of the day.

Liz and I made a conscious decision that as our children were growing up, certainly in their pre-teen years, we didn’t want the negatively biased news impacting their view of the world so we rarely had the news on when the kids were young because it basically is biased to be just telling us about all the bad news… with an occasional good news panda story.

Our sons, now young adults, rarely watch mainstream news. Like so many of the post baby-boomers, their news feed is via social media and they get to pick and choose the stories they want to watch and learn more about.

The reality is, as highlighted in Henry Edwards’ article, “According to scholars like Steven Pinker at Harvard and Max Roser at Oxford, we live in the best time in history. Just as crime has fallen, so too have rates of HIV infection, homelessness, extreme poverty, war, murder, youth drug use, underage drinking, smoking, air pollution, and hunger. At the same time, many of the good things in life have been on the rise, including longevity, high school graduation rates, educational attainment, vaccination rates, access to mobile phones, democracy, transportation, and human rights.”

Sure there’s some serious stuff that still needs fixing, but I recommend you take a moment to consider how much your current view of the world, humanity and your future is being shaped by bad news.

 

Share this article
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Email

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

More Articles & Research from David Penglase

Lead like Nordic Countries to Boost Well-being and Success

Hold yourself accountable for fostering trust, mutual respect, and support in your own teams and between individual team members, and there’s a big chance you’re going to positively impact the well-being of your individual and collective team members … oh, and at the same time, science also tells us, you’ll more than likely get a boost to your own sense of life satisfaction and well-being too.

Read More »

Intentional Trust and Courageous Conversations

In this post I want to share with you some thoughts on the importance of trust-based conversations, or what are sometimes referred to as courageous conversations. You know what I mean I’m sure – a conversation that requires truth, respect, empathy, care, and careful wording.

Read More »

LIVING in the Light of Day

This is an update on my new book – LIVING in the Light of Day. I am so very proud of this – it’s my best book yet. I’ve been researching and writing this for almost 18 months now, and COVID has given me some ‘breathing space’ to get it finished … and that’s why I haven’t posted to my blog this month. The book is an evidence-based guide on how to Build Character, Earn Trust and Act with Integrity… and you can receive a gift copy of the first chapter.

Read More »