Why are we humans so susceptible to the doom and gloom of the news? Two reasons.

The first is what psychologists call negativity bias: we’re more attuned to the bad than the good. Back in our hunting and gathering days, we were better off being frightened of a spider or a snake a hundred times too often than one time too few. Too much fear wouldn’t kill you; too little surely would.

Second, we’re also burdened with an availability bias. If we can easily recall examples of a given thing, we assume that thing is relatively common. The fact that we’re bombarded daily with horrific stories about aircraft disasters, child snatchers and beheadings — which tend to lodge in the memory — completely skews our view of the world.

In this digital age, the news we’re being fed is only getting more extreme. In the old days, journalists didn’t know much about their individual readers. They wrote for the masses. But the people behind Facebook, Twitter and Google know you well. They know what shocks and horrifies you, they know what makes you click. They know how to grab your attention and hold it so they can serve you the most lucrative helping of personalised ads. This modern media frenzy is nothing less than an assault on the mundane. Because, let’s be honest, the lives of most people are pretty predictable. Nice, but boring. So while we’d prefer having nice neighbours with boring lives, ‘boring’ won’t make you sit up and take notice. ‘Nice’ doesn’t sell ads. And so Silicon Valley keeps dishing us up ever more sensational clickbait, knowing full well, as a Swiss novelist once quipped, that “News is to the mind what sugar is to the body.”

[Extracted, with edits and revisions, from Humankind: A Hopeful History, by Rutger Bregman, Bloomsbury Publishing, London, 2021.]

Based only on the author’s statement that “we’d prefer having nice neighbours with boring lives”, and the author’s argument about the nature of news that modern media exposes us to, which of the following would the author be most likely to agree with?

Correct Answer: The news modern media exposes us to is very different from our day-to-day experiences.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

1. Analyze the Question Prompt:

The question specifically asks us to rely on the author's statement that “we’d prefer having nice neighbours with boring lives” alongside the author’s overall argument regarding the nature of news served by modern media, to determine which statement the author would most likely agree with.

2. Deconstruct the Relevant Passage Extracts:

• Day-to-day lives: The passage describes real life by stating, “Because, let’s be honest, the lives of most people are pretty predictable. Nice, but boring. So while we’d prefer having nice neighbours with boring lives...” This establishes that our daily experiences and surroundings are typically ordinary, predictable, nice, and boring.

• Nature of news media: The author writes that “‘boring’ won’t make you sit up and take notice. ‘Nice’ doesn’t sell ads. And so Silicon Valley keeps dishing us up ever more sensational clickbait...” and describes modern media frenzy as “an assault on the mundane.”

3. Draw the Logical Inference:

Since our day-to-day lives are mundane, nice, and predictable ("boring"), but modern news media exclusively focuses on sensational, horrific, and extreme stories because "boring" and "nice" don't sell ads, it directly follows that the news modern media exposes us to is very different from our day-to-day experiences.

4. Evaluate the Options:

• "The news modern media exposes us to is very different from our day-to-day experiences." — Correct. This directly synthesizes the contrast between our mundane/boring day-to-day lives and the sensational news served by media.

• "The news modern media exposes us to is just like our day-to-day experiences." — Incorrect. This directly contradicts the passage's assertion that news is an "assault on the mundane."

• "Constantly being exposed to negative news gives us a warped perspective of the world." — Incorrect context. While mentioned in the text, this stems from the availability bias argument, not specifically from the premise about preferring "nice neighbours with boring lives."

• "In our hunting and gathering days, it was better for us to be unnecessarily scared rather than being scared too little." — Incorrect context. This relates strictly to the negativity bias section, not the specific prompt condition.