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- The pandemic has resulted in many people exhibiting an unusual behaviour for which psychologists have a clinical name: cave syndrome.
- The infections, lockdowns and the atmosphere of uncertainty have together prompted many to harbour the view that the outdoors are dangerous.
- This is a natural response to the pervasion of infections and after spending a year in relative isolation.
- Cave syndrome gets its name from this tendency to remain secluded in our safe spaces – or caves – instead of venturing outside.
More than a year has passed since the novel coronavirus began wreaking its havoc. In this time, we have read about, and encountered, chilling accounts of people displaying severe symptoms like fever and breathlessness, fatal post-COVID infections like mucormycosis and mental health issues arising out of lockdowns and partial curbs on human mobility and interactions.
The pandemic has also resulted in many people exhibiting an unusual and expectation-defying behaviour for which psychologists have a clinical name: cave syndrome.
The infections, lockdowns and the atmosphere of uncertainty have together prompted many to harbour the view that the outdoors are dangerous and that they are better off in the comfort of their homes. They have also been riddled with unsettling questions like “what if I catch the infection?” or “are the seats in my classroom properly sanitised?” or ‘is my co-worker fully vaccinated?”
This is a natural response to the pervasion of infections and a year spent in relative isolation.
Cave syndrome gets its name from just this tendency to remain secluded in our safe spaces – or caves – instead of venturing outside.
Cave syndrome before COVID
The term ‘cave syndrome’ has been used since the first pandemic lockdowns; it existed before the pandemic as well but was known by other names.
A February 2020 article in The Lancet presented evidence of avoidance behaviours from empirical studies conducted during the 2003 SARS outbreak in China. One study found that 26% of respondents had steered clear of crowded enclosed spaces and 21% had avoided stepping outside for a few weeks after being quarantined. The article also cited another study to suggest that the act of avoiding crowds had been transformed into long-term behaviour and that these people’s return to normalcy had been delayed by many months.
For another example, the Ebola virus disease that ravaged West Africa from 2014 to 2016 took away many lives before the region was formally declared Ebola-free in 2016. A qualitative study conducted in Sierra Leone documented the experiences of a community during and after this outbreak. It found that most of the country’s people lived in fear and anxiety for several days after and that even teachers hesitated to come to schools.
Humans are inherently social beings, which means living in isolation for prolonged periods can be quite the ordeal. While many of us may have shared memes and appreciated social media posts expressing a longing to step outside during the first lockdown last year, how many have since visited a local park or a popular roadside tea stall since restrictions were lifted?
Three intertwined behavioural aspects could be at play here: risk aversion, the desire to be in control and the preference for the status quo.
People like certainty, but the pandemic immured us in a thick blanket of uncertainty that has kept us from making easy decisions about stepping out. We can exercise a reasonable degree of control over our houses; we can clean all its surfaces and restrict some people from visiting based on their vaccination status. But we have almost no control on outside spaces.
Second, when we make decisions without all the information required, we gamble with our health.
For example, a 2020 study by researchers from Australia, Germany and New Zealand examined the links between variations in human mobility during COVID-19 outbreaks and the average risk preferences of people, in 58 countries. They reported that even before the WHO formally declared the spread of the novel coronavirus to be a pandemic, there had been a decline in visits to transit stations, offices, grocery stores and pharmacies in areas characterised as risk-averse. Even people in relatively more risk-tolerant areas stepped out less often.
A little over half of the people who participated in a 2020 survey, from across 11 countries, reported that they were risk-averse than ever before.
Third, the pandemic has precipitated drastic changes in our ‘new normals’.
Taken together, many of us responded by receding into our caves and adjusting to the changes that we expect accordingly, are now resistant to more change and wish the world to remain as it currently is even as we can stay indoors.
Cave syndrome in India
Some surveys have hinted at the prevalence of cave syndrome in India. For example, Google’s ‘COVID-19 Community Mobility Report’ for India can be useful to discern patterns in people’s movement compared to the baseline, in various categories. The graph below shows India’s mobility trends in August and September 2021. In these months, the rate of addition of new cases declined and vaccination rates saw an uptick.
The percent change from baseline vis-à-vis workplaces has been more or less negative. But this isn’t a ‘clean’ indicator of people’s preferences because some of them may also need to bow to their bosses’ pressure and work from the office. So consider the retail and recreation trends, where mobility has dropped 10% relative to the baseline. This change can be attributed, at least in part, to cave syndrome because people have complete control over decisions to go shopping or engage in recreational activities. The same thing goes for visits to parks.
Next, a workplace survey in summer 2021 reinforced the idea of people liking to be in control. When asked whether one was more productive when working from home, and if so, why, 46% of respondents said working from home allowed them to better control their time and 45% said they could manage their personal workspace as they wished.
A third survey reported that 52% of its respondents in 11 nations were apprehensive over having to return to the external office for full-time work because they didn’t wish to lose their freedom to choose where to work, to take time off to read books, and other such freedoms.
Not for everyone
While office-goers are able to stay in their ‘caves’, many others don’t have that privilege. The substantial contribution of food-, grocery- and package-delivery agents helps keep the work-from-home model afloat. A survey conducted by Rakuten Insight in August 2021 found that there has been a 41% increase in shopping frequency for food delivery services. While food-delivery services have sought to celebrate their delivery personnel as ‘Corona Warriors’, their work itself heightens their risk of getting infected.
Additionally, in 2020, online grocery sales expanded by 80% to $2.66 billion, as many offline players like D-Mart and Nature’s Basket entered the online space to ensure essentials like milk and vegetables were promptly delivered to buyers’ doorsteps.
Among food and package delivery agents and drivers of ride-hailing services like Ola and Uber, the converse of the cave syndrome appears to be at play. Some cities imposed night curfews toward the end of 2021, while Zomato expanded its fleet of delivery agents to help restaurants meet demand from online orders. But as more delivery personnel are employed, their work conditions become increasingly precarious. Many agents are already overworked, paid less and are at constant risk of getting COVID-19.
A 2021 report, ‘Labour Standards in the Platform Economy’, assessed 11 companies on five parameters: fair pay, fair conditions, fair contracts, fair management and fair representation. Flipkart topped the list with a score of 7/10; Urban Company scored 5/10; Amazon, Dunzo and PharmEasy scored 1/10 each; and Ola, Porter and Uber had scores of 0 each.
This report highlights the issue of ‘precarious employment’, a term commonly used to describe the nature of work performed by gig workers. According to the British labour economist Guy Standing, these ‘precariats’ enter into a “precariatised mind” in which they’re always scrambling to figure out what to do with their time.
In the large-scale layoffs that took place during the second COVID-19 outbreak in India, many people turned to the gig market and began taking up jobs in the package delivery sector. Always reeling under existential insecurity, the precariats, to quote Standing, “have no occupational narrative to give to their lives”.
Akshaya Balaji is a research assistant with the Department of Economics, Monk Prayogshala, Mumbai.