The act of doomscrolling can be attributed to the natural negativity bias people have when consuming information.[1] Negativity bias is the idea that negative events have a larger impact on one's mental well-being than good ones.[14] Jeffrey Hall, a professor of communication studies at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, notes that due to an individual's regular state of contentment, potential threats provoke one's attention.[15] One psychiatrist at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center notes that humans are "all hardwired to see the negative and be drawn to the negative because it can harm [them] physically."[16] He cites evolution as the reason for why humans seek out such negatives: if one's ancestors, for example, discovered how an ancient creature could injure them, they could avoid that fate.[17]