According to a new study that sought to investigate the mental resilience of journalists, results showed that journalists' brains have a lower-than-average level of executive functioning.
Researchers suggest that journalists might have a more difficult time than others when it comes to things like suppressing biases, solving complex problems, switching tasks, managing emotions, and trying to engage in flexible or creative thinking.
At least 40 different journalists were studied, from about 90 who applied to take part in the investigation.
Of the 40 that were chosen to take part, they came from magazines, broadcast, newspapers, and other areas. But not every participant was able to complete every task that was required of them.
The journalists were required to keep a food and drink diary, submit to blood tests, heart rate tests, and a brain profile questionnaire. The study took place over a period of several months and the journalists took part in exercises that were meant to assess their health, behavior, and lifestyle.
The reason they wanted to look at journalists was because this is believed to be a profession that is regarded as being a high-stress environment and filled with many different pressures.
Researchers suggest that the various elements which contribute to journalism being a stressful environment are things like deadlines, public accountability, public scrutiny over their work, unpredictable workloads, and more.
It was assumed that because of the stress surrounding the job, that those in the profession would exhibit things like poor diets, lousy sleep quality, high levels of stress, and so on. Surprisingly, they found that on average that the journalists were no more stressed physically than the average person would be.
What they did find was that journalists have issues with alcohol, caffeine consumption, and high-sugar foods. At least 41 percent of the participants said that they drank about 18 units of alcohol a week or more. They also scored lower on executive functioning tasks and showing an ability to silence the mind.
Issues with this study are that it hasn't yet been peer reviewed, the sample size was obviously very small, there weren't enough variables, and there was no control group.
There are a variety of different journalists out there today and these results are not representative of them all.
Pics:
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Sources:
http://www.bandt.com.au/media/study-journalists-insominiac-alcoholics-crap-diets
http://www.businessinsider.com/journalists-brains-function-at-a-lower-level-than-average-2017-5
http://www.taraswart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Report-Study-into-the-mental-resilience-of-journalists-Dr-Tara-Swart.pdf
http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/booze-and-coffee-addled-journalist-blames-impaired-executive-function-for-lack-of-scepticism-in-intro/