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Science Quickly

Avoiding Outrage Fatigue in Overwhelming Times

Science Quickly

Scientific American

Science

4.31.4K Ratings

🗓️ 5 February 2025

⏱️ 8 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

It’s almost impossible not to feel outraged these days. But overexposure to information that makes us angry can wear us down. Senior health and medicine editor Tanya Lewis joins host Rachel Feltman to discuss how to combat outrage fatigue. Plus, we discuss a surprising finding about outrage and the spread of misinformation. Recommended reading: –Read Tanya Lewis’s full story on outrage fatigue –Listen for tips on converting cynicism into hopeful skepticism  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter. Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Madison Goldberg and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman with guest Tanya Lewis. Our show is edited by Madison Goldberg with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

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0:29.7

For Scientific American Science quickly, this is Rachel Feldman. No matter what you believe,

0:35.2

I'm willing to bet you've been feeling a lot of outrage lately.

0:39.4

To me personally, it feels unavoidable.

0:42.2

I can't look down at my phone or glance up at a TV without seeing something that makes me upset.

0:48.1

And that's really exhausting.

0:50.5

But when outrage is everywhere, what can we do to keep it from getting to us?

0:55.2

Here to talk to us about fighting so-called outrage fatigue is Tanya Lewis, a senior editor

1:00.4

covering health and medicine at Scientific American.

1:05.4

Tanya, thanks for joining us today.

1:07.7

Thanks so much for having me.

1:09.3

So you recently wrote about this phenomenon called

1:13.4

outrage fatigue. Could you tell us what that is? Sure. So outrage fatigue is kind of an informal

1:20.0

concept, which basically refers to repeatedly experiencing perceived moral transgressions

1:25.5

and feeling fatigued by them.

1:27.7

So what that basically means is just, you know, you see something, you're outraged by it,

1:32.7

and over time you just become kind of numb to it.

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