The Psychology of Rewatching

You know the feeling—you’re sitting on the couch, scrolling through endless streaming options, but nothing seems to catch your eye. Then, almost without thinking, you click on that one movie you’ve seen a dozen times. It’s familiar and comforting, like revisiting an old friend. While it might seem odd to watch the same film over and over, there is a psychological reason behind this habit. Scientists have discovered that rewatching your favorite movie can offer surprising mental and emotional benefits.

In a study conducted by Dr. Jaye Derrick, a professor of psychology at the University of Houston, college students were surveyed on their rewatching habits, emotional experiences, and attachment to favorite TV shows. Derrick measured the psychological benefits of rewatching shows by having participants complete a structured questionnaire that assessed mood improvement, stress reduction, and emotional comfort, providing quantitative data on their experiences. His team found that rewatching favorite shows requires less cognitive effort, provides emotional relief, and offers a sense of predictability, making it a common coping mechanism for managing stress and negative emotions. Participants reported feeling more relaxed and comforted when watching familiar content compared to new, unpredictable media.

Dr. Jalpa Bhuta, a psychiatrist at Global Hospital, stated that familiar content is much less cognitively demanding because the brain already knows what to expect. In a study conducted by Pepperdine University professor Cristel Antonia Russell and Northwestern University professor Sidney J. Levy, they examined how people emotionally engage with familiar media. In their research, they divided participants into two groups: one group watched a film they had previously seen, while the other group watched a new, unfamiliar film. The researchers used cognitive load measurement techniques, including heart rate variability and self-reported mental effort, to evaluate the participants. Self-reported mental effort refers to when participants are asked to reflect on how much mental energy they felt they had to use during the task. This subjective measure, often recorded on a numerical scale, helps researchers gauge how cognitively demanding an activity feels to the individual. In this study, those watching the familiar film reported lower mental effort, indicating it required less cognitive processing compared to the group watching the unfamiliar film. The same study was also done using functional magnetic resonance imaging, which tracks brain activity by measuring changes in blood flow. Researchers found that the group watching the familiar movie showed less activation in areas of the brain related to cognitive processing, such as the prefrontal cortex, which is involved in decision-making and working memory. This concludes that familiar content demands less mental energy, making it a comforting, low-effort choice for relaxation.

In other words, watching Cinderella lose her glass slipper at midnight for the 10th time is much easier for the brain to absorb than watching the new movie that just hit Netflix last week. These reinforcements occur because of a phenomenon known as the mere exposure effect. It suggests that repeated exposure to a stimulus increases perceptual fluency, which is how easily a stimulus can be processed. This causes an individual to like something just because they are simply familiar with it, also known as the familiarity principle. This repeated exposure stimulates specific neural pathways, particularly in regions like the hippocampus, which is involved in memory and recognition, and the prefrontal cortex. Over time, these pathways become easier to activate due to watching the same movie, making the familiar content feel comfortable and enjoyable.

It is helpful to observe this in individuals with anxiety since they tend to have a higher cognitive load, which places additional stress on their working memory. The brain constantly processes and holds information, but there comes a point where it reaches its capacity. A study by Shian-Ling Keng, a professor in the Department of Psychology, School of Medical and Life Sciences at Sunway University, investigated the effects of media consumption on individuals with anxiety. Participants who had high levels of anxiety were given the option to watch familiar films or new ones. The results showed that those who watched familiar movies reported significantly lower anxiety levels and reduced cognitive strain compared to those who watched unfamiliar content. Giving a mentally exhausted mind this time to regain its energy can help those who are anxious restore feelings of self-control. 

When you watch a new movie, many regions of your brain are activated to process the film. The visual processing is done by the brain’s occipital lobe while the auditory cortex decodes the movie’s sounds. The prefrontal cortex, in charge of higher-level thinking processes, helps to look at the content of the movie, like the plot and characters. The limbic system, mainly the amygdala, deals with the emotional reactions to the movie, while a third of hippocampal neurons work to remember the aspects of the new movie and make connections to past experiences. However, when watching the same movie again, the brain relies on fewer hippocampal neurons to remember the stored information about the movie. As a result, less cognitive effort is required for understanding the movie since the brain already knows the narrative. Regarding the brain’s reward system, rewatching a movie that was previously enjoyed leads to the release of dopamine, a neurotransmitter associated with pleasure. While new movies can also trigger dopamine release, the familiarity of a beloved film enhances the anticipation of enjoyment, often resulting in a more significant release. This repeated exposure makes neural connections stronger so that the information is more easily accessible. 

Understanding the preference for rewatching movies and TV shows offers valuable insights into managing stress and seeking comfort, especially for students facing academic pressure. Familiar content can serve as a mental break and provide emotional relief. By recognizing the benefits of rewatching, students can make intentional choices about their free time, using familiar media as a tool for emotional regulation and mental recovery, ultimately supporting their overall well-being.