Subscribe
The latest psychology and neuroscience discoveries.
My Account
  • Mental Health
  • Social Psychology
  • Cognitive Science
  • Psychopharmacology
  • Neuroscience
  • About
No Result
View All Result
PsyPost
PsyPost
No Result
View All Result
Home Exclusive Cognitive Science

Negative news evokes stronger psychophysiological reactions than positive news

by Beth Ellwood
March 20, 2020
in Cognitive Science
Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
Follow PsyPost on Google News

A cross-national study suggests consumers around the world have stronger psychophysiological reactions to negative news when compared to positive news. The report is one of the largest of its kind and was published in PNAS.

Bad news tends to dominate the headlines and one explanation involves something called the negativity bias. This term describes the tendency for people to give more weight to negative information over positive information. This bias towards negative content has important repercussions where media is concerned, since it affects what gets reported in the news and ultimately how citizens view current affairs.

“In a period during which news around the world is especially wrought with negativity, this subject is of obvious significance,” said study author Stuart Soroka of the University of Michigan in a news release.

Most of the existing research on negativity bias in response to news was based on Anglo-American samples. This recent report aimed to expand this research by examining the negativity bias on a cross-national level, with results from a 6-continent experimental study. Researchers also set out to look at individual differences in reactions to negative news.

This extensive study compared results from lab experiments run in 17 different countries and involving 1,156 participants. Participants watched seven BBC World News stories while their physiological responses were measured via skin conductance and blood volume pulse. Participants were shown news stories that were either positive, negative or neutral in tone, as assessed by expert coders.

During negative news stories, participants across all countries showed higher heart rate variability than during positive new stories, which could be due to heightened attention and arousal. Furthermore, those watching negative news showed a greater change in normalized skin conductance levels compared to those watching neutral or positive news. This suggests again that negative news evokes greater physiological arousal from consumers across the globe.

Researchers note the great significance of these findings, which suggest that people all around the world react more strongly to negative news content. While journalists are responsible for producing more negative news, it could be that consumers are demanding it, consciously or not.

Still, while people’s reaction to news showed a negativity bias overall, researchers discovered a great deal of within-country variability. Many participants actually showed no change in responses when videos became increasingly negative in tone. More research is needed to explain this variability, but it seems that individual differences were not strongly connected to country of origin.

The study reveals that a negativity bias in reaction to news is not simply a North American phenomenon. Although the findings show an overall increased arousal towards negative news, the large amount of individual variation in responses suggests that more people than previously thought might actually prefer positive or neutral news items. The results, the authors write, “highlight the potential for more positive content, and suggest that there may be reason to reconsider the conventional journalistic wisdom that ‘if it bleeds, it leads.'”

The report, “Cross-national evidence of a negativity bias in psychophysiological reactions to news”, was authored by Stuart Soroka, Patrick Fournierc, and Lilach Nir.

TweetSendScanShareSendPin2ShareShareShareShareShare

RELATED

Scientists observe lasting cognitive deficits in long COVID patients
Cognitive Science

Therapeutic video game shows promise for post-COVID cognitive recovery

May 20, 2025

A new study finds that a therapeutic video game, AKL-T01, improved task-switching and processing speed in people with post-COVID cognitive deficits. While sustained attention did not improve, participants reported better quality of life and reduced fatigue after six weeks of gameplay.

Read moreDetails
Brain oscillations reveal dynamic shifts in creative thought during metaphor generation
Cognitive Science

Brain oscillations reveal dynamic shifts in creative thought during metaphor generation

May 19, 2025

A new study reveals that creative metaphor generation involves shifting patterns of brain activity, with alpha oscillations playing a key role at different stages of the process, offering fresh insight into the neural dynamics behind verbal creativity.

Read moreDetails
Surprisingly widespread brain activity supports economic decision-making, new study finds
Cognitive Science

Surprisingly widespread brain activity supports economic decision-making, new study finds

May 19, 2025

A new study using direct brain recordings reveals that human economic decision-making is not localized to a single brain region. Instead, multiple areas work together, with high-frequency activity encoding risk, reward probability, and the final choice itself.

Read moreDetails
Scientists use brain activity to predict StarCraft II skill in fascinating new neuroscience research
Cognitive Science

Scientists use brain activity to predict StarCraft II skill in fascinating new neuroscience research

May 16, 2025

A study combining brain scans and gameplay data reveals that players with more efficient visual attention and stronger white matter connections excel at StarCraft II. The results highlight how neural traits shape success in cognitively demanding video games.

Read moreDetails
Neuroscientists discover music’s hidden power to reshape memory
Memory

Neuroscientists discover music’s hidden power to reshape memory

May 14, 2025

A new neuroimaging study reveals that listening to emotionally charged music during memory recall can change how we remember events. The music not only shaped what participants remembered but also altered the emotional tone of their memories one day later.

Read moreDetails
Study links anomalous experiences to subconscious connectedness and other psychological traits
Cognitive Science

Study links anomalous experiences to subconscious connectedness and other psychological traits

May 13, 2025

A new study suggests that unusual experiences like déjà vu or premonitions are not only common but linked to a distinct psychological trait called subconscious connectedness. Researchers found that people high in this trait reported significantly more anomalous experiences.

Read moreDetails
Eye-tracking study suggests that negative comments on social media are more attention-grabbing than positive comments
Cognitive Science

Can you train your brain to unsee optical illusions? Scientists think so

May 12, 2025

A recent study found that radiologists are less susceptible to optical illusions, likely due to their intensive visual training. The research challenges long-standing beliefs that illusions are automatic and suggests perceptual skills can be shaped over time.

Read moreDetails
Diets high in fat and sugar appear to harm cognitive function
Cognitive Science

Diets high in fat and sugar appear to harm cognitive function

May 10, 2025

Consuming a Western-style diet packed with sugar and saturated fats may hurt your brain, not just your waistline. A new study shows poorer performance on spatial memory tasks among people with diets high in processed, unhealthy foods.

Read moreDetails

SUBSCRIBE

Go Ad-Free! Click here to subscribe to PsyPost and support independent science journalism!

STAY CONNECTED

LATEST

What brain scans reveal about the neural correlates of pornography consumption

AI chatbots often misrepresent scientific studies — and newer models may be worse

Is gender-affirming care helping or harming mental health?

Study finds “zombie” neurons in the peripheral nervous system contribute to chronic pain

Therapeutic video game shows promise for post-COVID cognitive recovery

Passive scrolling linked to increased anxiety in teens, study finds

Your bodily awareness guides your morality, new neuroscience study suggests

Where you flirt matters: New research shows setting shapes romantic success

         
       
  • Contact us
  • Privacy policy
  • Terms and Conditions
[Do not sell my information]

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In

Add New Playlist

Subscribe
  • My Account
  • Cognitive Science Research
  • Mental Health Research
  • Social Psychology Research
  • Drug Research
  • Relationship Research
  • About PsyPost
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy