How to manage election anxiety

According to a recent poll by the American Psychological Association, more than two out of three Americans say the upcoming presidential election is causing a significant amount of stress in their lives.

Today, On Point: The consequences of election-related stress, and what you can do to manage it.

Jon Krosnick, professor and lab director at Stanford Political Psychology Research Group.

Rheeda Walker, professor of psychology at Wayne State University.

Dr. Jenna Beckham, gynecologist.

Part I

MEGHNA CHAKRABARTI: A recent poll from the American Psychological Association found that close to 75% of U.S. adults are stressed out by the election. And that includes a whole bunch of On Point listeners.

(LISTENER MONTAGE)

Indeed, I am experiencing election related stress.

The presidential race is too close. I'm worried about violence afterward. And I feel our very democracy is at stake.

Started to realize, oh my god this is stress again. This is, and it's terrible. I don't like it.

I'm overcome with panic attacks, waking up several times in the night.

This election is not only causing me a lot of stress, but my 20 year marriage may not survive it.

I'm trying to remind myself that I must maintain hope, because the alternative is not helpful. But I am definitely tending more toward pessimism everyday.

The thing that's stressing me out the most is the fact that everybody else seems to think it's going to be over on November 5th, and I don't.

If Kamala wins, it's going to be a nightmare, because they're going to refuse to accept the election, and I don't know how it'll turn out this time. And if Trump wins, it'll be another nightmare, just a different way.

CHAKRABARTI: And that anxiety is not going unnoticed by mental health professionals. Professionals like Joan Pavlinsky  in Charlestown, Rhode Island.

JOAN PAVLINSKY: I am a psychotherapist working for a large clinical practice in New England. The majority of my patients are Democrats, a few Republicans, and a few MAGAs. I'm astounded at how much Trump's toxic rhetoric has seeped into people's brains, giving them license to continually practice bad behaviors, whether it's a DUI.

CHAKRABARTI: The poll also found that the stress cuts across party lines. 80% of Republican respondents, 79% of Democrats, and 73% of Independents all said that the election is a significant source of stress. And many adults are also specifically concerned about the fate of this nation. 77%, in fact.

The poll, called Stress in America 2024: A nation in political turmoil, also reveals that more than half of adults polled say they have very little to no trust in the U.S. government, and that distrust is seeping into our basic human connections, too. The American Psychological Association says that half of the people they talk to said that tensions around politics makes them less likely to want to connect with other people, and almost a third of folks say they have nothing in common.

Nothing. With people who have different political opinions than they do. The level of anxiety surrounding this election has been truly notable. And the APA has done this survey often in the past. And the levels of election related stress now, are about 20 points higher than they were in 2016.

So how is all of that stress changing your health and even your spirit? How can it be better managed? We're joined today by Professor Jon Krosnick. He's at Stanford University and with the Political Psychology Research Group there. Professor Krosnick, welcome to you.

JON KROSNICK: Thank you. Good to be with you.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay, so how would you define what political anxiety actually is right now?

KROSNICK: You did a beautiful job in your introduction of characterizing the anxiety that we're seeing. And there are so many sources that you captured so beautifully in the quotes of folks you interviewed. I'm going to compliment The American Psychiatric Association survey that you mentioned, with one by the Associated Press and the National Opinion Research Center.

And that was released just a couple of days ago, showing results that characterize anxiety just as you would think, worry, lost sleep, a lost sense of confidence and self.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. And but then is it, I don't want to say, is it unreasonable. Should we be surprised that politics and elections are causing that?

KROSNICK: It's, I think, a new phenomenon. The challenge for us is that decades ago as scholars studying political psychology, anxiety about election results was not the top of our research agenda. So we don't actually have a long term trend measurement using good scientific methods to evaluate whether anxiety is greater now than it was.

But I think a great example of evidence that is consistent with it is that survey researchers in the last few elections have started to ask voters, before elections, are you worried about this election? And it didn't even occur to researchers to ask about that before. What's interesting for me is that in the Associated Press NORC Polling. They asked the same question in October of 2020. I think there's a sense we all have that maybe the anxiety is more profound this year. But actually, at this time this year, 69% of Americans in that survey say they're feeling anxious, and four years before, 65% of Americans said they were feeling anxious.

So I think the anxiety is different this time around, but it's not at an unprecedentedly high level.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. Now, is the anxiety, though, around the specifics of the election, though, or is it about politics more broadly? Is it about the future of the nation question, I want to come back to that.

Are we able, through these recent polls, able to pinpoint more what the anxiety is specifically about?

KROSNICK: The Associated Press work actually is terrifically helpful in pinpointing sources. And so let me just give you an overview first, that there are, it's really about risk. Anxiety is about, the worry is about the possibility that something bad will happen in the future. And there are various types of risks that are confronting voters at this point, Americans, even, given that only about half the country will vote in this election.

First, the risk that government will do things that people don't want. What's unusual about this election is that historically, political scientists have shown over and over again that candidates for a president have typically tried to do what they call hug the middle, try to express their positions on policies, not to take extreme positions and not to alienate moderate voters who are undecided as they head toward Election Day in this election, as Project 2025 was leaked to the public, and described remarkably extreme set of conservative oriented policies. And that sets up a stark contrast between a former president Trump and Vice President Harris in a way that I think voters have not been used to seeing. They can see now very divergent lines of policymaking after this election.

So that's one thing to worry about, is the candidate you don't want to win is not going to do about the same things as the candidate who you are looking forward to winning. So there's risk there. Second is undesirable outcomes. And so we're hearing much more than we have in the past. Candidates claiming that if my opponent is elected, things are going to go badly in the economy.

The economy is going to tank. We're going to be overrun by immigrants. Other kinds of threats have been articulated. And so that's risk of bad outcomes. Then of course, as your quotes highlighted earlier, there's the risks focused on Election Day the risk of violence disrupting the election itself, as ballot boxes have already been burned.

The violence has started already. And the possibility that on Election Day, there may be people trying to interfere with the casting of votes, that there may be violence after the election results are announced, is all a source of anxiety. Some people are anxious about the risk of dictatorship.

They're not used to the possibility of a president taking control of the government in a way that some have said President Trump would do, there is the dismantling of the federal government, that it turns out that many Americans actually like the fact that the federal government provides Medicare and Medicaid and the military and other services, and the thought of dismantling the government for them is a source of anxiety.

And I'm sorry to say that even in my own area of expertise of polling, our polling is undoubtedly a source of anxiety too, in a way that we haven't been used to in the past.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. So several of those make a lot of sense to me, right? Just straight up anxiety over the outcome, right? And especially because people feel that there's so much on the line with the outcome, given the different diverging policies that would come with those, and then also the risk of violence.

Definitely we have seen that. But I just want to clarify something. When you said the ballot boxes having been burned, I only know of one occurrence of that so far. Portland, Oregon. So I just, I don't want us to say that, to come across, to generate more anxiety by making it seem like this is a thing that's going on all over the country.

Do you know of any other occurrences?

KROSNICK:  I said ballot boxes because I believe in Portland, more than one box was burned.

Editor's Note: The Associated Press reports one ballot box was set on fire in Portland and another in Vancouver, Washington. One man is suspected of causing both fires.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. Maybe wrong. Yes. So that's fair. But it's just so far in Portland, Oregon. Portland, Oregon. There's one other thing I want to go back to about that, you started off with in this list of things that are causing people stress and anxiety.

And that is you mentioned Project 2025. I don't think it was leaked. They were very upfront about what they wanted from the start. It was out on their website. That's actually how we covered it. But what I wanted to ask you about, isn't it fair to believe, though, that there were people were feeling anxiety before that, or are we seeing, because the differences between former President Trump and Vice President Harris, I think, were plain before that, or is it that something around, since you mentioned Project 2025 brought in, opened other people's eyes and raised the overall level of anxiety?

Can you clarify?

KROSNICK: It turns out, luckily, the Associated Press and NORC were doing surveys asking this question of excellent random samples of Americans, dating back into 2019 through 2020, and up into 2024. And what we see is, back in 2019, the level of anxiety about the 2020 election was only at 44%.

Whereas now it's at 69%. And that level of anxiety has risen over time, they don't have measurements over the last few months. So it's hard to know whether anxiety went up as a result of the Project 2025 leak or coverage or not.

Part II

CHAKRABARTI: We received some messages from people who are working during this election, poll workers.

And one of those is Jim from St. Paul, Minnesota. He would have been working the election this year, but it is different for him this year.

JIM: I became an election judge just before the midterms and really enjoyed the experience and felt much more a part of democracy, but this cycle has just gotten to be so rancorous that I actually find my anxiety disorder not going through the roof, but really increasing to the point where I had to essentially decline to work this election, because I just didn't feel it was good for my mental health.

So I do plan on voting, but right now I'm just trying to avoid as much of the media stories about it as I can.

CHAKRABARTI: That's Jim from St. Paul. Howard is a listener who told us that he loses sleep over the worry of that as president, or if Donald Trump becomes president again, that he would threaten much of the social progress made in the 20th century.

HOWARD: As an African American, I know all too well our country's history and what it's capable of. And I see in one of our candidates a rollback to loss of our civil rights gains over the last hundred years. And that's very concerning to me. Keeps me up at night. What am I doing about it? Has activated me to write postcards, participate in the process, give money to the opposition campaign.

And aside from that, try to limit the amount of information that I intake.

CHAKRABARTI: That's Howard. Now Professor Krosnick, I want to just pick up on something that Jim said a little bit earlier, before Howard, and that was he said he actually had an anxiety disorder that was perhaps being exacerbated by this election.

When we talk about election related anxiety, I think the one concern I have, or clarification I need is that anxiety is one of those terms in general now that I think for many years has been somewhat overused. What would be the specific symptoms or detrimental impacts that you would be thinking of when talking about truly the negative effects of anxiety or stress related to the election?

KROSNICK: As a social psychologist and a political psychologist, I study the sources of these stress more so than the symptoms or the strategies for managing them. But what I can tell you is that what we are seeing these days is distraction in a sense that the news professionals, forgive me for saying so, are in the business of putting this election front and center for voters every day. And that barrage of information, including new news that has come to light in the last month or so, is on the one hand, an attractant for voters who want to stay up on the race, who care about the outcome.

But on the other hand, it is a source of concern. To return to the theme we mentioned a moment ago, I think one of the fundamental causes of this anxiety that's unique for this election is the pre-election polls. So let's talk about that for a second, that we all remember, that prior to the 2016 U.S. presidential election, when Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were competing, we all went to bed the night before the election.

Having read the 538 group and The Upshot group were predicting that Hillary Clinton had more than an 80% chance of winning that election. We know that didn't happen, of course, and that raised concerns about the accuracy of polls. But in 2008, prior to Barack Obama's victory, the polls consistently showed a lead for Mr. Obama in the months running up to that election. And then we had a colossal economic meltdown that said for sure the Democrat would win this election. And of course he did. But there was concern that the pre election polls during that run up might have been wrong, because people might have been hiding their unwillingness to vote for an African American candidate.

That concern, of course, turned out to be wrong. But here we are this year, uniquely looking at polls that over and over again have been said to show a tie between the candidates. And I think that's an important stoker of the anxiety. That if it were the case, that the polls were consistently showing a lead of one candidate over another.

There would be people who would be sad. There would be people who would be excited, but people wouldn't be as worried as they are, due to uncertainty, because uncertainty is a powerful source of anxiety.

CHAKRABARTI: Uncertainty. Okay. So there's one aspect, I'll lean on your social science background professor, that I want to dig into. Because what's coming to mind here for me is that it seems that over time we have seen a whole bevy of studies that show or find that if you identify as a liberal or a progressive versus as a conservative, that there's evidence that there is a heightened level of mental health distress amongst self-identified liberals or conservatives. For example, I'm looking at a study that showed in terms of depressive affect score starting in roughly 2012, women specifically who identified as liberal, their rate, the rate of increase in their depressive affective score was much, much higher than  women or men who identified as conservative.

Is that part of what we're seeing here, or is there more general, generalized anxiety across the political spectrum now?

KROSNICK: There are really two important points I think to make. First of all again, focusing on the Associated Press NORC survey done recently, when you think about America and politics, it's so tempting for all of us to see the country as deeply and equally divided, that the news over and over again talks about polarization and the image that on just about every question that half the country, it takes one side and the other half of the country takes the other side.

That actually is a mischaracterization of American public opinion. There are lots of areas in which the public is largely in agreement, actually, and you may be surprised to know one of those areas is climate change, that even majorities of Republicans endorse the existence and threat of climate change, and support government action to reduce emissions in the future.

And it turns out that election anxiety is also nonpartisan or bipartisan, there are some partisan asymmetries. But the Republicans and Democrats in the country actually share this anxiety, but for different reasons, the important point to make to start with, though, is that it would be a mistake to think of the country as 50% publicans and 50% Democrats.

In fact, it's about 30 percent Republicans, 30% Democrats, and the remainder, another 30% are Independents. And those are the people, of course, who are going to decide this election. And those are the people who are still in the business of making their decision. So your characterization is certainly correct that the Republicans and the Democrats in the population know who they want to have win.

Those Independents are still in that process of making a decision. But I want to point out just one example of bipartisan quality, that when NRC asked their respondents, whether the loser of the presidential election has an obligation to accept the results. 86% of American adults said that the loser has that obligation.

22% of Americans said they thought that Kamala Harris will not accept that result. Whereas 66% of Americans said they think Donald Trump will not accept that result. So there's an asymmetry, such that the more liberal leaning, democratically leaning voters have reason to worry about that element more than Conservatives.

CHAKRABARTI: Now, point well taken. Okay, so let's now move to talking a little bit more about how this, let's see, election or future of the nation driven anxiety is really seeping into other parts of people's lives. I think that's really an area of major concern here. Dr. Jenna Beckham is a gynecologist who says election fueled anxiety about reproductive health and transgender care is taking a toll on how she's seeing people manage their health care.

JENNA BECKHAM: I have patients who just, they are grappling with a tremendous amount of uncertainty and really deep and truly appropriate fears about further restrictions on their health care and their rights being stripped away.

And so there are times where I think they have had those plans of seeking some form of contraception that's maybe longer acting, or a surgical sterilization, or a gender affirming hysterectomy that is part of their plan, and probably has been for a long time. But there is a new sense of urgency that many patients have felt, they have needed to accomplish these things and to seek this care and be sure that it gets done before Election Day,

CHAKRABARTI: Dr. Beckham says she's even seen women thinking about becoming pregnant, voicing concerns about how the election could change their desire to become parents.

BECKHAM: I have had so many of those conversations with my patients, many of whom maybe have been pregnant before and want to again, and even some who've never been pregnant, but regardless, who very much want a pregnancy or planning a pregnancy, it has been a part of their plan, but have come to me many times to say, in a different world, I would be trying to get pregnant. I would like to be pregnant. I want to be a parent. I want to carry a child, but I am terrified. What if something goes wrong? Can you explain to me what the specific laws are?

What would I need to do if X, Y, or Z happened? And sometimes after those conversations, they simply say, I can't risk that, so I'm not going to get pregnant right now.

CHAKRABARTI: Dr. Beckham says that issues of law and politics are becoming a much more common part of her patient visits. But often, they're asking questions that she just can't answer, since she's a doctor, not a lawyer.

And that's taking a toll on her as well.

BECKHAM: I have that same anxiety for them and for my ability to practice medicine. And it's a bad feeling to not be able to give answers and provide information to patients, because that is part of my job. I should be able to answer their questions and guide them in their care.

And it's hard to say. I don't know what's going to happen in November, and I don't know what your options for health care will look like in 2025.

CHAKRABARTI: And by the way, in the past, she says that these kinds of conversations just weren't that common, but now, concerns like these are voiced by her patients daily and sometimes repeatedly in the same visit.

But Dr. Beckham says there's one thing that would help with her own anxiety, and that's if politicians voiced trust. In her experience, as a medical professional.

BECKHAM: I wouldn't tell an electrician how to do their job or a mechanic. Really, I don't have that knowledge and that training. And I would just ask the same respect of politicians, that they, again, respect me and my colleagues and many people in this country who have gone to many years of medical school, completed residency training, fellowship training.

I'd like to bring Rheeda Walker into the conversation now.

She's a professor of psychology at Wayne State University and author of Calm in the Chaos: A Quick-Relief Guide for Managing Anxiety & Overwhelm in Loud & Uncertain Times. She's also author of The Unapologetic Guide to Black Mental Health. Professor Walker, welcome to you.

RHEEDA WALKER: Hi. It's great to be here.

CHAKRABARTI: I would like to actually for a minute focus on what was brought up there by the doctor, because she was talking specifically around concerns that her patients have over reproductive health or transgender care. I know that you've studied and thought extensively about how anxiety particularly has impact on people of color or other groups like that.

Can you talk about that in relation to this election now?

WALKER: We're living in absolutely unprecedented times, that is the reality. And when we think about even the broader context. And I appreciated the conversation that you were having with Dr. Krosnick. That is, we have been experiencing increasing elevated anxiety and depression for some years now.

And it's great that we're starting to ask these questions so that we can have increased awareness. And we have to start there. There are so many people who are probably listening now, who hadn't thought about their level of anxiety. And by the way, anxiety and depression oftentimes go together. So about 50% of people or so who experience anxiety also experience symptoms of depression.

And so that's helpful for individuals to know. And if I can, for just a moment, actually go back to the question about anxiety and what it looks like, because it is, the worry, the uncontrolled fear that people have. And I think Dr. Krosnick did start to fill some of that in where people don't know what's going to happen.

And so we fill in the worst possible scenario. And for some, the worst possible scenario is real. Like, how am I thinking about starting a family, something that wasn't real. really questioned, maybe five or so years ago, or maybe even five or so months ago. But it's also just heightened irritability.

So for individuals who may be snapping at coworkers more so than usual, losing patience with their children and other loved ones, that can be a feature of anxiety, difficulty sleeping. And that looks like not just having problems falling asleep, but waking up through the night and waking up really early in the morning.

For some people, they're more physical symptoms, so they may feel like they have like tightness in their chest. Now, some of that could actually be a health concern, and so we want to make sure that they have ruled out physical health concerns. Hypertension, heart attack, things of the potential heart attack, things of that nature, but the tightness that people feel in their bodies that they're having difficulties managing.

Those are all things to be mindful of. And I'll share my own example. Just a couple of days ago, I was driving my son to a basketball practice that I've driven him to many times, and I missed the turn twice. And my son's, okay, lady what's going on here? And for me, that was a signal, for some people, they might just dismiss it.

But for me and recognize everything that I have been doing over the course of recent months, that was a signal that maybe I need to go to bed earlier. And I need to reset. And to be honest, I've lost track now of your question.

(LAUGHS) So tell me again what it --

CHAKRABARTI: No, that's okay. I appreciate you giving us your own personal example, actually, because it's making this conversation very real.

And we only have about 30 seconds left before this next break, so I'll ask the question again, but I'm also going to give you a chance after the break to answer it. You actually started getting to it, about the fact that the reason for this anxiety for many people is because the outcomes to things like elections can have actual real impacts on their lives, right? And I guess I was just getting to, an easy way to brush all this off is just to be like, Hey, suck it up, get over it. Life goes on. But the truth is for many people, they're feeling stressed because they're genuinely concerned about how their own lives could actually change.

And you know what? Sorry. Okay. Today, maybe we're all just like showing levels of our own anxiety. I'm not mishandling the clock right now. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to take this quick break, let you answer that when we come back. And then with both you, Professor Walker and Professor Krosnick, I want to hear, of course, ways for us to manage, for everybody, regardless of your political affiliation, how to manage this kind of stress, this anxiety and make yourself mentally healthier. So we'll talk about all of that when we come back. This is On Point.

Part III

CHAKRABARTI: Professor Walker, I'd love to now give you enough time to give us the answer about the fact that the causes of some of this anxiety are the genuine concern about potential impacts to people's lives, depending on how the election turns out.

WALKER: Yes, all very genuine concerns, and everyone's anxiety also is going to look different. So one anxious person is going to look very different from another anxious person. And so we don't want to make comparisons that say, Oh that person's dealing, they seem okay. And I should be able to manage. At the end of the day, we all want to be able to function.

We need to be able to go to work. If we work outside of the home, take care of those responsibilities, take care of children, sometimes elder parents who may be living with us or maybe outside of the home. For them, we have different deadlines. We have all sorts of responsibilities. And at the point when we feel like we're not able to do the things that we are called to do, or that someone is expecting of us by a certain deadline or whatever, then that is a challenge that warrants responding to. And I say that because there's so many of us who take our minds for granted.

Especially high functioning individuals, we're accustomed to being able to accomplish so much with so little and with less and less time, even though we're supposed to be being much more progressive. We accomplish so much with so little. And at the point when whatever it is that we are experiencing overwhelms us so much that we're not able to do the things that we typically have been able to do, that warrants a response.

And so as an example, for the physician, who provided insight about for that person, who is concerned about their ability to do their job, but maybe it's keeping them up at night. But then they're also not able to engage in many problem solving or connecting with coworkers, because there is no doubt in my mind that there are other physicians who have similar kinds of concerns.

But they also need to be able to have the bandwidth to come together and problem solve collectively in ways that make sense. But again, if they're overwhelmed and sleep deprived and have so many things going on, it's going to be nearly impossible to be able to problem solve in a way that makes sense for them.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. So now let's spend the rest of the conversation trying to be proactive, right? And I want to hear from both of you, but Professor Krosnick, I'm going to first turn back to you. Because you said something which I think was actually quite right earlier, that the media, and of course, On Point is included in that broad scope of media, is like breathlessly covering this and every election.

And the reason why I wanted to come back to that is I don't feel defensive about that at all. It's absolutely true. And we spend a lot of time here on this show thinking about how to cover the election in a way that's actually more meaningful than one poll after the other. But at the same time, I just sometimes want to turn it all off, in my own head, if I'm perfectly honest with both of you.

And I totally understand how people, just regular people, feel that way. But there's also this competing obligation. And I think individual Americans feel a competing obligation. They may want to turn things off, because they know that's a healthy thing to do, but they also want to stay informed, right?

They want to know what's happening in the world, in their lives, in politics. And that's the same reason why we keep covering the election too. So I'm wondering, Professor Krosnick, how would you advise people balance those two needs?

KROSNICK: You characterized, I think, the value of the news media and media coverage beautifully, because what we have seen for decades is that election seasons and media coverage of campaigns for the country as a whole actually contributes to better democracy. Because as an election campaign unfolds, Americans become better and better informed about the country, and they often base their vote choices on retrospective assessments of how well the current administration has been doing.

In other words, if the country seems to be doing well and getting better economically and internationally, the party in power is likely to retain the White House for people who perceive the country to be moving in a bad direction economically or internationally, they're likely to vote for the opposing party.

And we want those votes to be well informed. We want those votes to be based on actual accurate perceptions of the country. And we rely on the news media. So I'm not actually blaming the media in a negative way. And normally, polling contributes positively to that learning process, because what it does is to turn the campaign into a boxing match.

In other words, in a boxing match, after each round, a judge puts up a score, and in the same way, typically, surveys have shown increases and decreases in the fortunes of candidates in response to events that have occurred. What's really unusual in this campaign is how stable the polls are showing a tie, and it's really that exposure to that uncertainty source that I think is an important cause of anxiety.

And I'll acknowledge to you my own embarrassment on behalf of my profession of survey researchers. We are unfortunately drowning right now in inexpensive nonscientific polls that are getting too much coverage in the media that we know. What I didn't mention to you was in 2016 when we were told Hillary Clinton had an 80 something percent chance of becoming president the night before the election.

If you looked only that year at the surveys that were done with true random samples of American adults, during the last week before the election, they predicted the Trump and Clinton shares of the vote with less than one percentage point of error. But unfortunately, those polls were overwhelmed by an ocean of non scientific polls of people who volunteer to do surveys for money, with no sampling at all from the American public.

And that's what we're drowning in right now. Because survey research companies make it really cheap and easy to collect those data. And unfortunately, I think that's what's leading to me to be able to tell you as an expert in survey research, I have no idea what's going to happen in this election. Because I see no informational value in the polls we're looking at.

CHAKRABARTI: Yeah. Okay. That's a really important point, but I also take a lesson away for the media as a whole, that we need to do a better job in researching the quality of polls before we report on them. Professor Walker, let me go back to you, though. I am still eager to hear what you think would be effective ways to manage this anxiety, because you made a really important point.

If it's getting to the level where people feel like they can't function or have the lives that they want, this has an impact on every other aspect of how we live. And so turn off the media  as often as you can. Good advice. I know that people often talk about mindfulness, exercise.

You can pick up on that or tell us if there's any other sort of more effective ways to deal with this.

WALKER: The balance that you mentioned already is absolutely key. So we absolutely want people to be informed for some folks, and actually there's research that would suggest that reading about news, maybe also listening to audio, but less so the video, that form of information is going to be less psychologically impactful and individuals can still be informed. Because that's the thing, right? Everyone wants to know what's going on. And I'm putting that in air quotes, what's going on. But some of that information is, in fact, just suspicious. We'll just say it's suspicious. And so we need to be also very mindful of the kinds of media that we are in fact consuming because we do want to be informed.

At the same time, there may be strategies where individuals say, okay, I'm not going to look at the news when I first wake up in the morning, or I'm going to wait until lunchtime, or I'm not, certainly not going to look at any of it or even read or consume any audio two or three hours before bedtime, because that might be disruptive to my sleep.

So we have to start first with assessment, what's going on with me, what might be the cause of this, maybe it's some of the media, maybe it's, I'm just overwhelmed with life, because life is still happening. And recognize that first, and then decide, do I need to take time to maybe even write down what all is worrying me?

Because one thing that individuals do that escalates anxiety is to ruminate. We rethink and we revisit, and we watch the same things over and over again, and that escalates anxiety. It doesn't add to any problem solving. And I'm convinced that one of the reasons that we ruminate is because we think we're going to come up with some new answer or some new insight or revelation.

It doesn't really work that way. But when we write things down, it allows us, somehow, and it works for me personally and it's worked with clients, to get a new perspective. And it's also one of the reasons that my collaborators and I came together for Calm in the Chaos, because if you think about it, there's chaos happening in different ways.

Throughout the years, throughout our lives, throughout our days, throughout the hours. But if we can be intentional about how we tackle those things, it makes us better prepared for when the chaos actually happens.

CHAKRABARTI: Can I just jump in here for a second? I'm so sorry, because you're saying things that are so smart and they all seem linked together to me, right?

'Cause you talked about balance in terms of how you consume media. You talked about not ruminating or perhaps instead of thinking through things in a more effective way, slowing down and writing things down, I think that can produce a really important kind of catharsis and it's turning the anxiety that can be, like, built up in the pressure cookers of our minds into an action, right?

So I wonder if you would also recommend different kinds of action, that instead of, I don't know, doom scrolling for six hours a day, deciding that for an hour of that, I'm going to go on a walk instead, or maybe for an hour, a couple of times a week, I'm going to go volunteer someplace and reinvigorate my connections with my community. Because it seems like action over endless rumination is a way to reduce this constant heightened state.

WALKER: Yes, both action and removing oneself from the things that are stimulating them. So going for a walk, yes, deep breathing. It's one of my favorite things to do. I even have a video on my YouTube to talk folks through how to actually breathe. We think we breathe because we're living. But deep breathing is a different level of mindfulness and bringing us into the moment.

Because yes, anxiety is us foreshadowing into the future and thinking about what's going to happen next Wednesday or next Thursday. But it grounds us more when we can be in the moment of today. And yes, for those folks who haven't voted in states where early voting is still going on, go vote. That feels so much better than waiting until this specific date and time and some magical thing is going to happen.

No, go ahead and vote today. And I love what one of the, I think it was, his name was Howard, maybe, who talked about how he was motivated to write postcards and he's been more politically active. So that's something in this context that people can do, that they have control over, because anxiety can happen when folks feel like everything is happening around them and they have no control over their situation or circumstances.

But getting engaged in the political process, yes. But then there was the gentleman who recognized that because of his preexisting anxiety disorder, being a poll worker or being a judge wasn't something that he can do. High five for individuals who recognize, you know what? I can anticipate that this is going to put me in a vulnerable place.

So I'm going to redirect myself to something else. Bravo.

CHAKRABARTI: I love this because basically what you're pointing out is that one way to manage this anxiety, which is driven so much by valid fears around insecurity or uncertainty, is to exert control where you can, right? And we all have the capacity to do that.

And it's very empowering to hear you say that, Professor Walker. Professor Krosnick, I want to turn back to you for something important here about why it's really essential that people who are feeling this way do try to do something to reduce their anxiety or their fear in whatever way they can.

Because you say that campaigns are taking advantage of people's heightened anxiety to influence votes.

So there's this, I don't know, tail chasing negative feedback loop from ourselves as individuals to our whole political system. Can you tell me just a little bit more about that?

KROSNICK: Yeah let me first pick up on and amplify and a theme that we just talked about by Mentioning by name, Jamie Pennebaker, who is a professor at the University of Texas, Austin, who I think is one of the pioneers of this write your way out of anxiety solution.

And for folks who are interested, looking at Professor Pennebaker's work will give you a sense of confidence that by sitting down and writing about anything, that's a source of anxiety in your life. It can be a really helpful way of organizing your thoughts and expressing those thoughts in a way, not only to yourself, but then allows you to talk with others about it.

And so that's all I think worth noting, but let me also mention the research of psychologist Dan Wegner, who I think wrote a famous book called something like Don't Think of a White Bear. And what Dan showed is that if you're trying not to think about a white bear, don't think about not thinking about a white bear.

What you've got to do is think about something else instead. And that in this particular case, I'm going to propose something that people can think about, because I'm a diehard optimist. When we look at American history. One of the things we know is that there has always been cycles and that kind of no state of affairs lasted forever.

So what we're going through now, what we may be going through in coming years is going to pass eventually and reminding ourselves of that is important. And not to be overly dramatic here. But World War II came to an end, the Hitler reign came to an end, very bad things happen and yet they do pass eventually, so that can be a source of peace for people to some degree.

Let me answer your question though about the question of whether the campaigns are taking advantage of this anxiety. Certainly.

CHAKRABARTI: We've just got about 30 seconds for this, for that answer. But go ahead.

KROSNICK: Yeah. The campaigns certainly are threatening. If my opponent wins, things will be bad.

That's drawing on anxiety. But what political psychologists have shown for decades now is that research when people are feeling anxious, they actually want to learn more about politics in the state of the country. And that's been a good thing for the democracy.