I think our brains are wired for hyper-compacted headline news (removes all nuance), emotional bits of info (high reactionary impact), especially if it's negative (survival instinct kicks in, makes a person feels alive).

It's (much) less work to obtain this info than other options (like walking to a store and buying a newspaper, or talking to your neighbor/friend, or doing a hobby instead).

That's my very quick take. Conserving energy once benefited us greatly, and now that feature is being used against us.