Netflix home screen on TV in dorm room
Photo courtesy of Evan Young
BY: LEAH ANSON, OPINION WRITER
Nothing beats the comfort of watching your favorite TV show. Whether you’re watching them cuddled up on the couch or eating a warm meal, these shows are simply unmatched. They help us decompress and make us feel at home. Why do we go back to those shows so often, and how do comfort shows affect us mentally?
When we constantly rewatch comfort shows it gives us a sense of nostalgia. Watching old shows reminds us of what our childhoods were like or brings us back to good memories. These feelings of nostalgia produce the “feel-good” chemical, dopamine, which fosters sensations of comfort, pleasure, and general happiness.
This sense of comfort and happiness that you experience when you rewatch a show is also because of the predictability. There are no surprises and no reasons to gain any additional anxiety.
An article titled, “Rewatching Your Favorite Shows Is Actually Good for Your Mental Health” says, “Knowing exactly what’s going to happen makes us feel safe and soothed, especially when life feels stressful and chaotic.” Going back to these shows is a great way to de-stress from the busy life of a college student.
Comfort shows are like a warm, comfy blanket. They make us feel this sense of home. “My favorite show is “Suits.” It’s a reliable show and reminds me of home,” said Deaglan Carney, a sophomore cybersecurity major. These feelings of home are a sense of familiarity that we constantly fall back on in times of sadness or stress. “Sometimes the best therapy is simply stepping back into a familiar fictional world,” said an article titled, “The Comfort of Familiar Worlds: Why Some TV Series Become Our Reset Button.” Constantly going back to comfort shows is a reset button that our brain uses to gain that sense of familiarity that we need sometimes.
Shows like “Vampire Diaries,” “New Girl,” “Law and Order” and others are just some examples that give me a sense of comfort. That being said, every person is different and associates different feelings with different types of media; others have comfort movies or even comfort documentaries. “I’m a big fan of untold documentaries on Netflix,” says Carson Hayek, a sophomore journalism major.
Whether it’s a comfort show, movie, or even documentary, they all give us that feeling of happiness and home. They slow down the stresses of everyday life and give us a second to breathe and return to when times were not so bad. Especially during exam season when everything is overwhelming, it is important to value time to de-stress. Putting on a good comfort show is the way to go. So, grab some popcorn, put on “Friends” and take some time for yourself.
