Emotional lockdown: cave syndrome: when the pandemic mode becomes permanent

Online survey at the Goethe University

How many people in Germany are affected by the so-called Cave Syndrome and why, Prof. Stangier wants a Find out online survey at Goethe University .

So far there is such data only from the USA. The American Psychological Association surveyed more than 3,000 adult Americans in February 2021.

Of these, 46 percent said they were not comfortable with going about their everyday life before Corona to return. 49 percent stated that they find it difficult to allow interpersonal encounters again.

“Social distancing” was the catchphrase of the pandemic, and reducing physical contact was a sin. What up until then had always been rated positively – going out, meeting people – became a risk and therefore viewed negatively. As a result, the reward value of interpersonal encounters has decreased, explains Stangier. Cooking, going for a walk or watching a movie took their place.

“After 18 months we got used to the fact that there was little social exchange,” says Stangier. “We have learned to experience pleasure and joy in other everyday activities.”

Cave syndrome is not a disease

The Cave syndrome is a normal phenomenon, not a pathological one, emphasizes Stangier. “It is not a disease, but a temporary adaptive reaction.” Stangier calls it a temporary “social anhedonia”: the inability to enjoy social encounters.

Contact with other people is actually a basic need: “Social isolation is a strong stressor for humans », says the psychologist.

Stangier assumes that the phase will pass by itself for the vast majority, maybe after two to three months. “But there are also people who experience permanent difficulties in getting out of isolation.”

He estimates this group at maybe five percent. Mostly they are people who have lived very withdrawn before. For them, the Corona period intensified their withdrawal and led to a depression or social anxiety disorder that does not go away on its own.

A phenomenon that generation researcher Rüdiger Maas has also observed. Since the beginning of the pandemic, his team at the private institute for generation research in Augsburg has been asking at least 1,500 representatively selected people every two weeks how they experience the corona pandemic. According to his assessment, the data clearly show that there is a Cave syndrome.

Some people want to keep pandemic everyday life

In the summer, around a tenth of people aged 40 and over said certain things from the lockdown times to miss. Almost seven percent of the so-called baby boomers (56 years and over) and around eight percent of Generation Y (26 to 39 years) even wanted to keep their pandemic everyday life.

Almost Half of the under 27-year-olds felt stressed in the summer from having to live out their regained freedom.

Since then, the numbers have changed only slightly, as a long-term analysis shows. which is available exclusively to the dpa news agency. The only tendency: over the months, fewer and fewer young people agreed to the phrase “I feel pressured to do a lot of things when it is possible again”. The approval ratings among the elderly rose.

“In one and a half years, behavioral patterns have crept in that have become entrenched,” says Maas. The tendency to withdraw is not solely due to the pandemic: “Corona was not the cause, but acted like an amplifier or accelerator.”

In the early surveys in 2020 showed that many people found the contact restrictions good, says Maas – to protect against infection, “but also because they no longer had the feeling that they were missing something: phlegmatism was socially desirable.”

Young people and children particularly affected

According to Maas’ assessment, young people and children are particularly affected by Cave syndrome: They experienced Corona in a formative phase, one and a half years Contact restrictions made up a much larger proportion of their lifetime. In addition, young people spend more time in digital space anyway.

“Independent of the corona pandemic, an increase in extreme forms of social withdrawal can be observed,” says Maas . Digitization has long undermined the need to meet people.

Stangier sees it similarly: adolescents have a greater need for social contact. “The fear of infection was always less than the desire for contacts,” says Stangier, hence the many meetings in the park, hence the illegal parties.

But also among the Many young people experienced uncertainty when returning to social normalcy. “Especially during puberty, adolescents are particularly vulnerable to the development of social fears, as being cut off from the peer group can seriously disrupt the development of social and emotional skills.”

Anyone who goes back to normal social contacts and who continues to hardly leave the house – that is mainly due to the psychological one Flexibility, Stangier believes.

“People’s ability to adapt varies greatly.” Those who are flexible can mentally and emotionally switch from pandemic to normal. Those who cannot get out of the feeling of isolation and isolation in the pandemic need longer time, especially if they are already having difficulties in social situations.

Many enjoy relaxation with caution

In addition, nobody knows what autumn and winter will bring, so that many respond to the easing only “with the handbrake on” and “at attention”. One thing is clear: “The pandemic has intensified the isolation through the digitalization surge,” says Stangier real benefits of this work situation. “But this also threatens the innate need for contact,” says Stangier.

In principle, the pandemic did not lead to a lack of interest in other people, the psychologist believes – on the contrary : “Most of them realized how important the contact and the relationship with other people is.”