The network-dominated era placed significant constraints on mass political information seeking, thereby reducing the potential for selective exposure. There is some concern, however, that the Internet fosters selectivity by allowing people to more easily filter out information they might disagree with. We suspect, however, that the flexibility of this information environment will facilitate selectivity under some circumstances but undermine it in others. In line with the seminal work in selective exposure presented by Sears and Freedman (1967), we predict that the web will be used to search for balanced political information when people are motivated to do so. This motivation comes from the interaction of two factors: individual differences and situational emotional triggers. In two separate experiments, we find that anxiety boosts balanced information seeking among those who are highly invested in politics (strong partisans) or those who perceive the information available to them to be useful. Non-partisans and those who do not perceive the information to be useful respond to anxiety by withdrawing from information they disagree with. These findings reaffirm Sears and Freedman's earlier insights, and demonstrate that the Internet is likely to have neither universally positive nor negative effects on political information seeking in contemporary society. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]