Mental Health and the Pandemic
Nell Williams
The article gave some unique insight to how the pandemic actually affected the mental health of the public. It was shocking to see this data that is far from what we have been hearing over the past year and a half. Many Americans and people around the world went into isolation, and like we believe now, the early stages of the pandemic created lots of increased problems in mental health, like increased depression and anxiety, but what is really shocking is that by the end of summer 2020, those levels were no worse than before COVID.
We thought the isolation would cause lots of mental health issues, but the article clearly distinguishes between imagining potential despair and the despair when something has actually happened. So, when people actually faced the worst times of the pandemic, scientists discovered that the suffering is far less prolonged than we had imagined (survivors had more of a bounce-back than we think, even though they still went through the despair).
The article does its best to clarify that this is not to downplay/invalidate the emotions or the limitless struggles, just to make us realize that humans can handle a lot more despair than we imagine. Of course, the mental health toll of the pandemic was not distributed evenly as everyone had a different experience (for example someone with financial struggles had different mental health experiences than someone who had the privilege to isolate without the worries of losing a job or not paying the next bill).
Questions
Do you think the creative projects ppl undertook during the pandemic (i.e. baking, working out, etc.) helped to reduce the mental health impacts of isolation?
Do you think it is fair to say that overall the mental health crisis was not as much of an impact as we think, even though we can’t see the impacts in every type of community? Does this article approach the situation from a privileged POV because it can underplay the amount of people suffering with mental health impacts from the extremes of the pandemic; like getting COVID, having severe financial struggles, or having pre-existing conditions (mental and physical)? For example- the article only mentions these disadvantaged groups of people once and I think it is fair to question if this data really took the POV of these groups fully into account.
Considering that we went through school at the time, which many people struggled with, is it surprising to you to find out that these mental health effects of the pandemic are not as heavy as we thought?
Links:
Article and picture: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/07/covid-19-did-not-affect-mental-health-way-you-think/619354/
Hi! I found it somewhat surprising that mental health rates weren't as heavily affected. I would imagine based on the chaotic conditions of the last year the rates would be higher. However, I understand that different people have different approaches to social isolation, in that introverts may enjoy this break from socialization as they can focus on hobbies and their close friends and family. Overall, even if the pandemic didn't have a huge effect on the rates themselves, it definitely created more emphasis on the idea of community in the United States and all across the world. -Lucky Payala
ReplyDeleteI am pretty surprised by the fact that mental health rates weren't as heavily affected. I assume that the adoption of new skills like baking and working out definitely helped with the mental health rates. Although, I do believe that staying at home helped increase peoples connection with their families, and this also probably had a massive effect on the mental health rates.
ReplyDelete-Aditya
Hi Nell,
ReplyDeleteThis was pretty shocking for me because I had heard and thought that mental health rates for most people were following a negative trend. It is good to know that through rough times like these, people are still able to handle the stress and pressure. My prediction for why this may be is because during this time, people were able to take time off work and other stressful things and kick back and spend time with family.
Alisha Johar
I definitely think the creative projects people started incorporating into their daily lives bettered the overall mental health of our community. I think it was a healthy coping mechanism and a good distraction.
ReplyDeleteI don't really think that this was fair to say, because although there were many people who were fine in isolation, most people had at least somewhat of an effect on their mental health.
This is surprising to me, because I know that I struggled a lot with the transition to online school and so did the majority of my friends. I think even introverted people struggled somewhat with these changes because they were so unfamiliar.
Tali
Iniya Swaminathan
ReplyDeleteEven though this article was surprising to hear about at first, I quickly started to realize how true it was! For example, many introverts and people who don't mind staying home probably enjoyed the lockdown a lot. And the people who do like to go out, probably adjusted and adapted quickly too. I feel like this is more behavioral. I also think because of the isolation, a lot of people grew. What I mean is that people changed and they matured and they learned more about themselves and the world. I wonder if people who were extroverts before the pandemic are now introverts and if the people who were introverts before the pandemic are now extroverts? Or at least a percentage of them.
Yes, I do think that the creative projects people undertook helped with mental health impact because it provided a distraction. I agree that the article may not have fully taken into account the mental health impact on all groups as probably a limited group was surveyed; it is likely that underprivileged persons were missed. On the final point, if the survey did not fully take into account the mental health impact, then the question doesn't apply; I do believe that there was a major negative mental health impact among students.
ReplyDeleteIn response to your last question, it is pretty surprising that people didn't have as bad a shock and increase in depression and sadness due to the pandemic, and school as well. I think in most cases it helped that it was virtual school, as I think that was less stressing to people, as in-person. I'd also like to point out that we don't know the metric that was used to determine how sad people should have been. Like how do you even test that? Also important to note that imagined despair and actual despair, while categorized as two different things, have the same outcome, being the person's sadness. In the end though I do find it quite surprising that the sadness people felt on a whole wasn't as bad as thought.
ReplyDelete-Aidan
It does not surprise me that the mental health effects of the pandemic were not as bad as we thought. While it was terrible in other ways, the pandemic brought people like me a lot of opportunities such as ways to reach out to friends and connect with family, time to pursue different hobbies, and a new learning environment that I initially preferred over the traditional one. It is sad to me that some of the only good things that came out of the pandemic are being somewhat abandoned. The main example of this for me is virtual learning, which I initially enjoyed due to the freedom and flexibility, but now it seems like virtual learning is intentionally being made much more difficult for students to try and discourage the continuation of it.
ReplyDelete-Embry Rickman
Hi Nell!
ReplyDeleteIt was surprising to me that the effects of the pandemic were not as bad as we thought. Based on a personal view of society, I would have thought that the effects of the pandemic were a lot more detrimental than we thought. Although I am glad people did not suffer with their mental health in such a severe way, I am curious to know what events could happen that have more of a global effect than a pandemic that would effect society's mental health in a greater way.
-Jesse Deutch
Hi Nell,
ReplyDeleteI would definitely agree that side projects and hobbies would definitely improves mental health, because it serves as time to take one's mind off of things and be occupied by doing something else they may enjoy. I somewhat agree with the statement that the mental health crisis was not much of an impact, but that truly depends on what your view of impact is. Whether it's suicide rates, depression rates, or any other way of measuring it, the effect of mental health is severe. We may not see this in every community because the resources and awareness of these problems may be different. It is surprising though, that the mental health effects were not as severe because of of course isolation and even just spending those extended periods of time with family, could cause tension in those relationships.
-Niveta Sharma
I think I was surprised that mental health rates did not significantly increase over the pandemic. However, I also do think that it might have gotten worse for some people. Furthermore I am not sure whether many people realized that they have mental health issues and are aware, because not every one has obvious symptoms.
ReplyDeleteI was very surprised that mental health rates did not increase that much over the pandemic because all I would ever hear from my friends and people online is that they have lost their spirit and that they are falling behind in everything. But I do know that a lot of people considered themselves to have mental health issues already before the pandemic even took place so I can somewhat believe that numbers didn't increase that much considering that people were already affected beforehand.- Ananya Senthilnathan
ReplyDeleteWOW, I am very surprised mental health rates didn't increase as much over the pandemic from what I saw on the news, internet, real life and personal experience I believed it increased a lot. Considering that people suffered the death of their loved ones, lost jobs and businesses, became poor, started to failed school and things like that, I would think it would increase. However, as long as the rates didn't decrease then I can see it can be true considering how people have already had mental health problems or do not realize they have them.
ReplyDelete- Trinity
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