For people who live in the path of a hurricane, the days before the storm hits are filled with boarding up homes and businesses, tying down boats, and preparing for power and water outages.
In between, there’s watching, reading, and listening to the latest news about the storm’s location, strength, and projected path. And while it’s imperative to stay updated in order to stay safe, new research says that consuming too much pre-storm news can actually have adverse effects.
In a study published in JAMA Network Open, researchers from University of California Irvine report that people who watch or read media in the days before a hurricane makes landfall are more likely to have negative mental health outcomes after the storm has passed. The more media consumed, the greater the impact.