Why Mental Hygiene Matters More Than Ever

Mental health is a particularly relevant topic in today’s world. One proof is the outcome of EZOP II—a study concerning the epidemiology of disorders and the availability of mental healthcare. Conducted in Poland in the years 2018–2021, it gathered as many as 15,000 participants. Its results show that every fourth resident of Poland has experienced a mental disorder at least once in their life and one in ten Poles suffers from one or more problems of this kind. The most widespread conditions include anxiety disorders (such as bouts of panic, phobias, or post-traumatic stress disorder – PTSD) as well as addictions (especially those connected with alcohol and tobacco).

Living under constant pressure and with fear of the future inevitably takes its toll. Consequently, it’s natural to harbor a grudge against the contemporary world or the way that societies function. However, we shouldn’t forget that our own choices frequently make it even harder to tackle the omnipresent challenges, and this is the subject matter of mental hygiene research.

All That Glitters Is Not Gold

The multitude of information reaching the human brain every day might lead to overstimulation: a state in which at least one sense becomes overloaded. Everyone’s familiar with the feeling of daze during a visit to a busy shopping mall or while riding on a crowded bus. However, it may even be triggered by somebody else’s intense perfumes. We all differ in sensitivity: some get tired of sounds, while others become distracted by lights or smells. Still, overstimulation manifests itself similarly regardless of the exact cause.

When the mind is no longer able to ignore the unwanted stimuli, it involuntarily begins to follow them. As a result, we find it harder to focus on work, our irritation grows, and stress swiftly sets in. Unfortunately, the brain does not act like skeletal muscles, which signal their exhaustion and demand some time off to regenerate. Instead, overstimulation may accelerate the already racing thoughts, many of them utterly irrational but still difficult to stop.

Naturally, certain factors remain beyond our powers: many people simply have to commute, and even the greatest enthusiasts of local stores might need an occasional visit to a shopping center. Therefore, let’s try to analyze what we can and should control to support our mental health.

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Missing Out on the Media

Information has become an inseparable aspect of human life. An increasing number of people dread the mere thought of not keeping up to date with news from the world or their friends’ lives. This phenomenon has even got its own nickname, FOMO (fear of missing out). A recent Polish study, FOMO 2022, shows that the problem reaches its peak among teenagers (age: 15–19 years), only 6% of whom are free from this anxiety. The results for other age groups prove alarming too: it turns out that permanent contact with the digital world and the information hunger makes people miss out on… real life.

Those with high FOMO levels use the internet and social media much more often not only during meetings with friends or at work (excluding their justified use for work), but also when crossing the street or driving a car—and this poses an obvious threat to safety. Almost a half of them admit to feeling overloaded with the information flow, and their stress level has proved nearly three times higher than the values manifested by the remaining participants.

Drowning in Stimuli

It comes as no surprise that taking appropriate care of one’s mental health requires careful selection of news from the constant information flow. One good method is to reduce social media scrolling. As marketers put it, when something is for free, the product is you. The real meaning of this catchphrase becomes evident once you realize the estimated number of advertisements we see every day, which most likely exceeds one hundred. All the colorful banners, images, and videos compete for the user’s attention and strongly involve the senses. Add to that the amount of information included in social media posts, reels, and stories, and the recipe for overstimulation is ready.

Moreover, your telephone sends information to your brain even if you’re not holding it in your hand. The notifications activated by various applications put the mind in a state of constant excitation and stress. It feels that it must be ready for something new to divert its attention any moment, and this quickly becomes very exhausting. Then, the brain regions responsible for advanced reasoning are the first to turn off. Psychology has even coined the term ‘phantom vibration syndrome’ (PVS), which refers to the false perception that one’s mobile phone or another technological device is vibrating when it’s not. The phenomenon is familiar to as many as 89% of undergraduates and might mean that the brain gradually transfers the permanent readiness mode to its everyday functioning too.

Everyone Loves Social Media… or Do They?

Social media does harm to the human brain in many more ways, and that’s what makes its reasonable use so crucial to mental hygiene. Psychologist Jonathan Haidt points out that the incidence of major depressive episodes (MDE) in teenage girls increased by nearly 10% in the years 2010–2016. Importantly, this doesn’t stem from the greater awareness of mental disorders today or their more frequent diagnoses because a similar increase was observed in people hospitalized due to self-mutilation. The researcher attributes those alarming statistics first and foremost to the growing popularity of social media, which create space for detrimental comparisons.

Young people, especially girls, are naturally the most vulnerable to such risk, but adults shouldn’t be tempted to think they’re safe. How many times have we actually been tricked into thinking that a published bit of somebody’s life showed their everyday reality? And then came the familiar feeling of regret that our lives couldn’t compare because we earned too little or were too old to make a change. We’ve all been there because it’s hard to resist such thoughts, especially after watching other people’s seemingly perfect lives several times a day.

How do we find balance in our lives then? Psychologist Jordan Peterson has devised twelve rules for life to help people reach the answer. Rule 4 reads: “Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.” This seemingly simple sentence actually carries a deep and rich meaning. First, we don’t know how others have obtained what they have today. People differ in their family conditions, talents, access to education, and many other aspects. Consequently, nobody can indicate the factor decisive in somebody’s ultimate success. Second, Peterson’s rule highlights the significance of self-development, which is the foundation for mental health and hygiene. Kazimierz Dąbrowski, a Polish psychologist and founder of the Mental Hygiene Institute, expressed this truth in a very straightforward manner: “Don’t look for mental health. Look for development, and you will find both.”

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