5 Ways to Cope with Obsessive News Checking

Obsessive news checking may tell you who you are.

Source: Photo by Luis Cortés on Unsplash

Obsessive news checking is the impulse to check your go-to news websites or social media to the point that you have difficulty focusing, and your concentration is out the window. Now that the 2024 presidential election feels like it’s minutes away and anticipation and anxiety levels are going up, it may help to get a grip on how you check the news.

From a therapeutic angle, this anxiety reaction makes sense: It’s your psyche’s reaction to a real external threat—in this case, the stress around this election, which many describe as “the most important in our lifetime.”

Is Obsessive News Checking OCD?

In a word, no. Checking the news obsessively would only rise to the level of obsessive-compulsive disorder if you started to believe something bad would happen if you didn’t check your news sources.

But it’s still a problem.

Obsessive news checking can be a normal stress reaction. It’s a repetitive behavior with an empty promise: Each time you check, you’re hoping for decisive news or some proof that the outcome you want will happen. The information you find is like empty calories, in that it keeps you coming back for more. Each time there’s no good information, your drive to return goes up in a maddening cycle.

It's not good for you.

A peer-reviewed 2022 study published in the journal Health Communication determined that obsessive news checking led to ill-being at the level of both mental and physical health. (McLaughlin) Including stress-related symptoms. Because obsessive news checking is a temporary anxiety issue, it may push you in the direction of relying on maladaptive coping behavior, such as abusing alcohol or compulsive eating.

The impulse to check news sites can also be a disaster for your sleep hygiene and can ruin the possibility of a good night’s sleep, which increases stress, and maladaptive coping, which drives the negative cycle.

How to Cope with Obsessive News-Checking

There’s nothing wrong with this; it’s an understandable human reaction to a stressful and scary socio/political situation. You care! But if you use a little bit of mindful strategy, you can pace yourself and make things manageable.

• Admit you have a problem. Accept that you’re doing this, and try to pay attention to the toll it’s taking on your day.
• Structure your attention and time. You don’t have to go cold turkey. This is a good lesson from neurodivergent folks. Try allowing yourself set times of day to check the news. For example, listen to one news show in the morning, check your sources at noon, and one last time at 8 pm. That's it—don’t check the news an hour before bed or during your sleep time!
• Give yourself some alternatives for your attention and focus. Once you set a structure and schedule to check your sources, focus on an activity you can do instead, such as meditating, going for a walk, or reading a compelling novel like a thriller or mystery. Try using positive self-talk to remind yourself you don’t need to keep checking, it will all be there when your scheduled time arrives.
• Limit access to the internet. If need be, just put yourself in airplane mode.
• Consider acceptance. Look, this election is hard. Maybe you should take the afternoon off, or not schedule any important work or meetings for the next couple of days. Accept that you will be obsessive, and see if you can be OK with that, and just focus on harm reduction. Do your best to be kind to yourself and go for a walk.

And there's a kind of silver lining to this problem: Your anxiety can tell you what your values are. If you are this anxious about the election, it means political events and aspects of social policy are important to you. Consider getting more involved and sharing your passion with other like-minded people. The peer support that comes from being in the community will help with the obsessiveness that can come from being too much in your own head.