We use the opportunity to validate our biases and we become blind to evidence that would negate our strong feelings. It takes a conscious effort to evaluate and check the sources, once that visceral reaction occurs.
A relative hair-trigger on whatever emotions and preoccupations a person already has. These days, for the 99%, there's no lack of negative ones. But if you've ever been around a little girl who's just recently discovered a fictional world full of magical talking ponies and such...
The modern world's focus on no-risk, passive entertainment - at extreme scale. While our distant ancestors told stories around the campfire, and cheap novels & fiction magazines were pretty common over a century ago, the modern world's 24x7 feeds of TV, cable, streaming, social media, etc. is something else. And that content is for-sure not teaching self-awareness, nor self-control, nor prudence, nor skepticism, nor ...