Doomscrolling.

Doomscrolling is the act of continually updating and reading one’s social media feed for the latest news on a significant event. It is closely related to doomsurfing, which is scouring the Internet for the same kind of information.

The term has been around for a few years, but found new popularity as a hashtag earlier this year, predominantly in response to Covid-19. It is surging again on Twitter today as people try to stay updated on the results of the US election.

It may be a relatively recently coined term, but it’s fair to say the activity to which it refers has probably existed for as long as easy access to the Internet, especially via platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, has been available.

It’s an understandable behaviour – we want to stay informed, after all. These things matter. We want to know. However, it can also be a very effective self-torture device, as it compels us to focus on what is actually causing our anxiety and distress. It seems that the worse the news is, the more people tend to keep on watching or reading. Some people even become fixated on that event, to the exclusion of other things, no matter how sad or angry it makes them.

The term also hints at the subjectivity of the behaviour: what one interprets as ‘doom’ is likely to be the exact inverse of what another person interprets it to be. It all depends on what outcome one is hoping for whether the course of events is classified as doom or a reprieve.

A highly relevant and helpful Twitter account is Doomscrolling Reminder Lady, who repeatedly tells people to get off the internet and take care of themselves instead.