For many high school students, life is a never-ending list of tasks — solving calculus problems, in-class essays, and attending sports practice — then going home to complete more homework. Amidst the stressors of the day, students often seek a mental break in between classes or after school, which usually means opening up Instagram or TikTok for a quick dose of entertainment.
The problem is that social media for “entertainment” doesn’t only consist of funny cat memes. Our For You Page also covers wars, school shootings, climate headlines, political outrage, and comment-section arguments. In ten minutes, you can absorb twenty separate crises, most of which you cannot solve, or even understand at the moment. The more you’re fed problem after problem, the more your brain starts grouping them as one message: the whole world’s on fire, and you’re a spectator.
This vulnerable, spiralling feeling that you experience after an onslaught of pessimistic information is aptly titled informational learned helplessness (ILH). Coined by Northwestern Professor Erik Nisbet after the COVID-19 pandemic, it is a form of learned helplessness that trains the brain to accept unfavorable scenarios given an information overload. As stress piles up after the day’s social media marathons, it starts to feel as though the world’s crises are permanent, and any action to address them would be futile.
It may seem that there are no ways to address these overwhelming issues, and it’s easy to fall into overwhelming feelings of distress that damage long-term mental health. To combat ILH, remember that it is triggered from conscious consumption of information — some positive, some negative, and some inaccurate. We cannot control the course of global issues, but they can control the amount of time they spend passively scrolling through them. Self-limiting screen time, reading one positive article a day, and spending study breaks with family or friends are easy ways to realign with the present. Simply discussing real-world issues with others can feel clarifying, and can help sift through some of the misinformation accrued from our screentime.
If a particular issue sparks passion, put down the phone and redirect energy into finding community and working towards small-scale change. Within PHS and in the broader Princeton area, there are a plethora of volunteer opportunities for people to make a difference. While collecting items for food drives or decorating cards for Alzheimer’s patients alongside their classmates, teens can feel the tangible emotional benefits of forming connections within a divided world.
Although informational learned helplessness is difficult to combat in our current media climate, our purposeful choices can help overcome it to benefit both our personal wellbeing and local communities. No matter how paralyzed you may feel, the most important thing is to stay grounded in our humanity and keep moving forward.