The Reuters Institute has released a comprehensive report that shows a sharp rise in the number of people avoiding the news because it negatively affects their mood.

The report indicates that news avoidance has doubled in Brazil and the UK over the past five years.

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The detailed qualitative research conducted in different countries by Nic Newsman, a journalist at the Reuters Institute, indicated that many respondents to the survey say that the news negatively affects their psyche.

“While the majority of people across countries remain engaged and regularly use information, we find that many are also increasingly choosing to ration or limit their exposure to it – or at least certain types of information. “, reveals the report.

“The proportion of those who say they avoid the news, sometimes or often, has doubled in Brazil (54%) and the UK (46%) since 2017 – and has also increased in all other markets. This type of selective avoidance seems to be less common in northern European countries such as Germany (29%), Denmark and Finland (20%), as well as in some Asian countries such as Japan (14%) .

The results show that the reasons for this avoidance are subjective and very divergent.

“Across all markets, many respondents say they are put off by the repetitiveness of the news – particularly around politics and COVID-19 (43%), or that they often feel burnt out by the news (29 A significant proportion say they avoid the news because they think they can’t be trusted (29%),” the report said.

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Many respondents under 35 say the news changes their mood.

“Around 17% of respondents say the news leads to arguments they would rather avoid or feelings of helplessness (16%),” the institute said.

“A small proportion say they don’t have enough time for the news (14%) or that it’s too hard to understand (8%).”

The results also showed that young people under 30 are now consuming information from visual networks such as Tiktok and Instagram.

Changing trends, aided by the coronavirus, indicate that audiences are moving towards more digital, mobile and platform-based news, according to the Reuters report.

Another key feature of the report is that trust in news information has declined in nearly half of the countries surveyed. Consumption of traditional media fell in almost every market, a decline that could not be offset by online and social consumption.

Other findings from the report are that younger generations are not thrilled to subscribe to media, big brands are seeing higher digital subscriptions, consumers are reluctant to share personal information, and TikTok is the growing network while that Facebook is still the most used social media, among the others.