Overcoming the Negativity Bias
Aren’t our brains amazing?
How we tend to notice when a room is messy, but not when it's clean.
How a negative interaction with a loved one can amplify all their flaws.
When one small thing goes wrong in your day and you can't let it go and suddenly it feels like the whole day was terrible.
I'm guessing you've heard of the negativity bias... how negative events have a bigger impact on our brains than positive ones?
We are wired to pay attention to more emotional events, and emotion circuits are more activated by the negative.
It's likely that this bias is a result of evolution. It was important to pay attention to bad news and signs of danger! Noticing threats and remembering dangerous experiences put you in higher likelihood of staying alive.
Plain and simple, our brains react more strongly to negative events -- this is mostly automatic and unconscious. Losing $10 makes you more upset than finding $10 makes you happy. Having an argument with a friend is more upsetting than a great conversation is uplifting.
And some people have even more negative bias, making life seem more awful than it really is. If you lean toward depression or anxiety, or mood disorders run in your family, your brain may be more sensitive and reactive to emotional information.
Can watching the news make you more negative?
Yes, in fact, it can!
When your mood gets worse, so does your brain's negative bias. Feeling down makes you more likely to notice negative things about the world and yourself and less likely to remember happy events.
What helps?
If you are someone who processes negative events and moves on fairly easily, you might suggest that your negative friend "focus on the positive" or "be more optimistic." This is not helpful.
Fortunately there are some things that can help regulate brain activity and keep our perspective more balanced.
While some of these things might seem overly simple, let that be a reminder of how easy it can be to care for ourselves.
Nonjudgmental awareness Practice noticing things in your life without reacting emotionally. (This is possible because awareness does not require emotion since awareness and emotion are mediated by different brain regions.) Yes, you could call this meditation. You can also bring it into other, more ordinary moments of your life. Notice without reacting.
Notice your negative bias The ratio of positive to negative reactions necessary to keep us at status quo is 3:1. That means we need to have and notice three positive experiences for every one negative in order to stay in balanced mind space. You can trick your mind and calm the emotionally-sensitive part of the brain by noticing your negative bias. Oh, I just noted this red light but not the prior three green ones.
Good sleep It’s so unsexy, right? But not getting good sleep — and that means both too little sleep and low-quality sleep — affects your hormones and immune system, worsens your mood, lowers your pain threshold and interferes with learning and memory. Sleep affects nearly every aspect of our waking life.
Move and break a sweat Yes, I’m talking about exercise, but it might be more helpful to think of it as having fun, be it playing frisbee or taking a Zumba class. Exercise has many of the same effects on the brain as antidepressants and almost everything that depression causes can be curbed by exercise. If regular exercise is a challenge for you, commit to a short trail period and see if your mood changes.
Relax your forehead and jaw It’s free, easy and immediate! Your brain takes signals from the body, and when the muscles of the brow and jaw are tense, the brain gets the message that something is wrong. Relax these areas to relax your brain.
Practice gratitude We’ve heard how powerful a gratitude practice can be. I like this slightly different take on it as well.
Get sunlight, see friends and remember happy times Again, these might seem too obvious to work, but remember, we’re just mammals who need sunshine and a tribe. Even if it’s on zoom or the phone, connect with people you love. Sit in the sun for 15 minutes every day (without sunscreen) and go through photos of happy memories. Your brain will thank you.
Which of these pique your interest? Which are hard for you? I’d love to hear.
You might notice that many of these are supported by Yoga practice, including asana and meditation. If you’re interested in creating a consistent home practice on your own schedule, check out my Remembership monthly wellness subscription.
Stay in touch and take care!
