← all facts
emotions
Your brain prioritizes threatening information over positive feedback.
A 2001 review demonstrated that negative events have a stronger and longer-lasting impact on the human psyche than positive ones.
This is the negativity bias. Evolutionarily, it was more important to notice a predator than a patch of flowers. Today, this manifests as our obsession with criticisms over compliments.
You have to work harder to remember the good than the bad.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Baumeister et al., 2001
- What the check found
- The claim correctly identifies the 2001 review paper 'Bad Is Stronger Than Good' by Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Finkenauer, and Vohs, which widely established the negativity bias in psychological literature.
- Confidence
- Well replicated
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.