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Introduction
Social distancing or physical distancing is a complex of non-pharmacological sanitary and epidemiological measures aimed at stopping or declining the spread of an infectious disease. Social distancing means limiting close contacts between people, even if they are not sick, not being in any of the risk groups. It is a voluntary measure to help stop the spread of COVID-19. Concerning quarantine or self-isolation, a person stays at home and avoids contact with other people, since there is an exposure that this person became infected with COVID-19 due to possible contact with the source of the virus. Meanwhile, quarantine can be declared by the government; the authorities have already introduced restrictive measures.
During self-isolation, there are some issues related to the flow of time. I have been chronicling and documenting my social distancing period for two months to understand the time changing and the differences between the passing days. It is necessary to stay current and not to lose a sense of the present. Moreover, describing emotions occurring during the period of self-isolation is a therapeutic practice. It reduces stress levels opening the reasons and effects on mental health. Besides, it can be useful for writing an article and doing research about what socially significant processes the pandemic has provoked. For example, the stories of people allowed historians to reconstruct the picture of events during the Spanish flu in 1918. These stories of social distancing and the healthcare system are still in the library archives.
Humans are social beings; throughout history, humanity has been living in communities, and interaction with relatives has become a vital necessity. As soon as people had lost the opportunity to interact with each other, they started enduring the negative impact of social distancing (Anderson, 2020). For those who have already experienced a feeling of loneliness, social distancing reinforced the sense of isolation. Lockdown concerns not only the inconvenience associated with distance working and the inability to go to the cinema, bar, or restaurant, but also affects mental health. In some cases, it takes only a few days to feel the adverse effects. According to Kumar (2020), self-isolation can cause anxiety or depression within a few days. Due to the situation with COVID-19, people with issues that are psychologically and emotionally troubling turned out to be in a hazardous condition. Instability, negative information flow, and lack of support contribute to suicidal thoughts, regardless of age, social status, and residence.
Lonely life and the short of full social interaction have many adverse effects on mental and cognitive health. Among the most common consequences, there are depression, poor sleep, and cognitive decline (Hotopf et al., 2020). The matter is complicated by the fact that people were cut off from each other against the backdrop of a severe epidemiological threat, global difficulties in the economy, and border closure. Depending on the psychological state and specific circumstances, isolation can provoke both depressive moods and increased aggression (Hotopf et al., 2020). According to Kumar (2020), isolation stimulates aggressive behavior at the chemical level. For preventing outbursts of rage, a person needs both discipline and consciousness.
Method
As people were forced to stay at home, it has become essential to conduct some rules. The measures, including paying attention to each family members personal space and avoiding sharing household items, were not crucial for me, as I was alone during my self-isolation period. Meanwhile, I limited the number of guests, friends, and relatives. I stayed at home whenever possible, refraining from visiting public places, such as shopping malls, gyms, cinemas, and restaurants. I have reduced the usage of public transport, preferring to walk rather than take a bus. I tried to keep surfaces that are often touched clean, primarily frequently used phones and keyboards. I left home only to buy food, choosing a period when there were fewer people on the streets. Any crisis reveals peoples weaknesses, so it was essential to adhere to a strict daily routine. Besides, a person needs to watch less TV, social networks, and other sources of information. In my free time, I could occupy my mind with an urgent matter and engage myself in self-education.
My social distancing period has taken almost two months, and as I have been living by myself for a long time, I decided to self-isolate alone in my apartment. During self-isolation, when it was allowed to go outside only to go for grocery shopping, pharmacy, or dog walking, the presence of an ample yard space near the accommodation has become an essential reason for me.
The main factors that can provoke the negative consequences for the mental health of social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic are the unknown duration of quarantine, fear of infection, boredom, demanding access to medical and domestic services, and the dissemination of inadequate information through social media. As part of a WHO, the group of scientists analyzed the medical work related to this topic (Brooks et al., 2020). Most respondents reported negative psychological effects, including symptoms of depression, stress, anger, confusion, irritability, and lack of sleep (Brooks et al., 2020). Studies have shown that emotional deterioration occurs when quarantine lasts more than ten days (Brooks et al., 2020). After quarantine, a specific effect called avoidance behavior may persist. When I was chronicling social distancing, I noticed that this phenomenon occurred to me as well. For instance, I minimized contact with other people or peers and stopped working for a while.
Those people accustomed to a large number of social contacts try to maintain them through the Internet. The phone remains one of the best communication tools because people can talk directly with others (Allington et al., 2020). On the other hand, there is a significant drawback when people absorb a large number of fake news overwhelming social media. Users experience the effect of echo chambers when any information can lead to panic reactions and changes in the perception of the situation (Allington et al., 2020). Nevertheless, social networks make it possible to stay connected. Living in the age of digital communications, during the quarantine period, a person can also use technologies to overcome the social distance while preserving the physical one.
Analysis
With regard to the virus, COVID-19 may be easily transmitted with microscopic drops when sneezing and coughing. The infection can spread through everyday contacts: by shaking hands or touching the same surfaces. Some people have an asymptomatic course of the disease, but they can be the virus conductor. Even when the patients well-being improves, he or she can be a disease carrier for some time. The purpose of social distancing is to diminish the spread of the virus, which is called to flatten the curve (Roberts, 2020). When people keep indoors and avoid contact with each other, the virus does not spread as fast.
At the same time, fewer people will get sick. Although the number of patients continues to grow, the curve on the graph of reported virus cases is more gentle (Roberts, 2020). This tendency allows doctors and hospitals to provide the necessary assistance to all patients with COVID-19. As long as I was not infected, there was a positive side to my social distancing. According to the doctors observations, children and young people easily tolerate coronavirus infection. However, I did not bring the virus to my grandparents or relatives who are in a high-risk group. This was the most prominent effect that my social distancing on preventing transmission of COVID-19.
Any situation of crisis serves as a good base for useful change adoption: developing desired habits, restructuring schedule for a more convenient one, and solving other personal problems. Meanwhile, concerning families that are bound to self-isolate together, quarantine noticeably affects the relations among members. Difficulties of isolation in the family may be associated with excessive communication and a lack of privacy. Not every household has a separate room and workspace. During this period, family time management, the distribution of duties, and their fulfillment, the difference in communication needs, and privacy can become big problems.
Being alone for the first time in a long time, people cannot always get used to a new lifestyle, which helps to explore difficulties in relationships and solve them. People are less interested in some petty issues related to everyday life, fuss, there are more questions about themselves, about interaction, about the quality of intimacy. Nevertheless, after social distancing, reuniting with other people has restored good mental and physical health. This experience helped me to realize a sense of affection with family and friends, to grow emotionally, or to gain a positive outlook on life despite the difficulties I have been through.
The reaction to staying at home depends on a persons habits. If people used to work remotely, nothing has changed dramatically for them with the introduction of quarantine. Therefore those who were interested in face-to-face contact, social distancing looks like a torment. The human psyche prefers constancy; the more new is around, the higher the anxiety level, which might transform into a panic. A reaction may occur after some time if a person experiencing an acute response to stress does not receive timely help. This happens if a person experiences a severe situational reaction alone or in an inconspicuous way for others. Social distancing has not become a period of panic and anxiety for everyone. For example, when employees are exhausted and tired of a non-stop work process, this might be a valuable time to take a break, rest, rethink, and understand hidden needs and wishes. The quarantine can also benefit freelancers working online as these days it is a profiting area of business.
With regard to the future and scientists forecasts, they are not entirely positive. They show the tendencies that prove the necessity to do more research related to the mental health of people practicing social distancing. According to a study published by Harvard University (2020), social distancing measures will have to be followed for another two years. Experts made this conclusion based on the computer simulation of a pandemic. Researchers note that the situation can develop in multiple ways (Kissler et al., 2020). Firstly, adherence to restrictive measures with enhanced epidemiological control can eradicate coronavirus. The same situation happened in 2003 with the SARS-CoV-1 virus, which provoked an outbreak of SARS (Kissler et al., 2020). Another model is as follows: after 20 weeks of self-isolation, another explosion occurs. Scientists explain this phenomenon by saying that quarantine measures may be useful, but the population does not obtain proper immunity. It is considered the first scenario less likely in the current circumstances, given the number of cases of COVID-19 (Kissler et al., 2020). The coronavirus infection will remain for a long time and will become a seasonal disease.
Conclusion
The rich can either work from home or go to their summer cottages. The poor remain in large cities and violate quarantine to survive. So, in New York, the residents of poor neighborhoods Quinx and Bronx were most affected by a coronavirus (Cook & Goldbaum, 2020). After analyzing the data from smartphones, experts found out that the citizens temporarily stopped the movement, but after a pause, they resumed it (Cook & Goldbaum, 2020). The infection has revealed widespread social stratification and polarization. Due to the circumstances, anomie growth can be expected as a result of the socio-economic crisis. Social distancing, especially the possible stress resulting, can exacerbate chronic somatic and psychosomatic diseases and provoke anxiety, panic, and depression. The easiest way of coping with issues is to self-isolate in appropriate circumstances. It would be more useful to endure restrictions if there were resources: money, health, stable work, a supportive environment, friends, relatives.
However, social distancing aggravates the serious problem of the isolation of older people. They are at higher risk of poverty and social exclusion, which directly affect their health. They need more support than ever before in this crisis, the measures applied to combat this pandemic must take this need into account. Quarantine as an extreme measure of isolation can lead to mental disturbance, including people without any psychiatric disorders. After a long time after quarantine, the likelihood of distress associated with fears, sleep disorders, or post-traumatic stress remains increased. Moreover, the gender and age of the patients, in this case, do not matter. Such measures should be resorted to only when they are inevitable and should always be limited in time.
References
Allington, D., Duffy, B., Wessely, S., Dhavan, N., & Rubin, J. (2020). Health-protective behaviour, social media usage and conspiracy belief during the COVID-19 public health emergency. Psychological Medicine, 1-7.
Anderson, J. (2020) Social distancing isnt the right language for what Covid-19 asks of us. Quartz. Web.
Brooks, S. K., Webster, R. K., Smith, L. E., Woodland, L., Wessely, S., Greenberg, N., & Rubin, G. J. (2020). The psychological impact of quarantine and how to reduce it: Rapid review of the evidence. The Lancet. 395(10227), 912-920.
Cook,L.R., & Goldbaum C. (2020). They cant afford to quarantine. So they brave the subway. The New York Times. Web.
Hotopf, M., Bullmore, E., OConnor, R. C., & Holmes, E. A. (2020). The scope of mental health research in the COVID-19 Pandemic and its aftermath. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 1-7.
Kissler, S. M., Tedijanto, C., Goldstein, E., Grad, Y. H., & Lipsitch, M. (2020). Projecting the transmission dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 through the postpandemic period. Science, 368(6493), 860-868.
Kumar, V. (2020). Psychological impact of lockdown period of COVID-19 on human behaviour. Tathapi with ISSN 2320-0693 is an UGC CARE Journal, 19(23), 65-71.
Roberts, R. (2020) Flattening the Coronavirus curve. The New York Times. Web.
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