Since 2014, the subreddit has been steadily growing and bringing our attention to the devastating things happening around us. From gruesome crimes to minor injustices, the community is dedicated to showing how bad our world can get. As the moderators say, “Lament with us as we view all things that are just genuinely awful.”

Sadly, we have a tendency to dwell on the things that go wrong and use stronger words to describe them. When it comes to the positive or neutral incidents, they seem to be not as important. Just think about negative stereotypes—humans are quick to form bad impressions and often have a hard time changing their views.

Even if some of us have a rather optimistic view of life, people still remember more details about their unpleasant experiences. “The brain handles positive and negative information in different hemispheres,” Clifford Nass, a professor of communication at Stanford University, told The New York Times. 

He said that negative emotions generally involve more thinking, and the information is processed more thoroughly than positive ones. 

Psychologists refer to this as the negativity bias. Picture it: you’re having a pleasant day at work until your coworker throws you an inconsiderate comment. When you come back home, what will you remember more—the overall good day or the remark?

Roy Baumeister, a social psychologist and co-author of The Power of Bad: How the Negativity Effect Rules Us and How We Can Rule It, said that it’s one of the most basic psychological principles that seems to be true everywhere. 

“A mind is prone to overreact to negative things relative to positive things; so people can use this to manipulate us, or we can use this to manipulate other people,” he explained. “If we understand this, we can prevent some of the negative effects and improve the quality of our social life.”

John Tierney, a journalist and the other co-author of this book, mentioned that the reason why we focus more on bad news is probably that it is aimed at the general public. “And the things that affect everyone tend to be negative—we’re all afraid of dying; we’re all afraid of being hurt. Focusing on those shared concerns is the easiest way to reach a mass audience.”

However, people on social media tend to share stories that are more pleasant. “That’s because the positive things we’re interested in—our hobbies, our cultural interests, the books we read—are more idiosyncratic,” he added. “Curating your news feed so that you’re not seeing so many negative stories can be good.”

Understanding and noticing our tendency to dwell on the negativities in life should help us to recognize that things are usually not as bad as we think. While it is important to share and discuss the problems we face in today’s world, it’s also vital to balance it out with the good stuff. So if you’re feeling a bit down, we’ve got you covered. Just take a look at some of our most recent wholesome posts here and right here.