the effect of covid 19 essay

How to Write About Coronavirus in a College Essay

Students can share how they navigated life during the coronavirus pandemic in a full-length essay or an optional supplement.

Writing About COVID-19 in College Essays

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Experts say students should be honest and not limit themselves to merely their experiences with the pandemic.

The global impact of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, means colleges and prospective students alike are in for an admissions cycle like no other. Both face unprecedented challenges and questions as they grapple with their respective futures amid the ongoing fallout of the pandemic.

Colleges must examine applicants without the aid of standardized test scores for many – a factor that prompted many schools to go test-optional for now . Even grades, a significant component of a college application, may be hard to interpret with some high schools adopting pass-fail classes last spring due to the pandemic. Major college admissions factors are suddenly skewed.

"I can't help but think other (admissions) factors are going to matter more," says Ethan Sawyer, founder of the College Essay Guy, a website that offers free and paid essay-writing resources.

College essays and letters of recommendation , Sawyer says, are likely to carry more weight than ever in this admissions cycle. And many essays will likely focus on how the pandemic shaped students' lives throughout an often tumultuous 2020.

But before writing a college essay focused on the coronavirus, students should explore whether it's the best topic for them.

Writing About COVID-19 for a College Application

Much of daily life has been colored by the coronavirus. Virtual learning is the norm at many colleges and high schools, many extracurriculars have vanished and social lives have stalled for students complying with measures to stop the spread of COVID-19.

"For some young people, the pandemic took away what they envisioned as their senior year," says Robert Alexander, dean of admissions, financial aid and enrollment management at the University of Rochester in New York. "Maybe that's a spot on a varsity athletic team or the lead role in the fall play. And it's OK for them to mourn what should have been and what they feel like they lost, but more important is how are they making the most of the opportunities they do have?"

That question, Alexander says, is what colleges want answered if students choose to address COVID-19 in their college essay.

But the question of whether a student should write about the coronavirus is tricky. The answer depends largely on the student.

"In general, I don't think students should write about COVID-19 in their main personal statement for their application," Robin Miller, master college admissions counselor at IvyWise, a college counseling company, wrote in an email.

"Certainly, there may be exceptions to this based on a student's individual experience, but since the personal essay is the main place in the application where the student can really allow their voice to be heard and share insight into who they are as an individual, there are likely many other topics they can choose to write about that are more distinctive and unique than COVID-19," Miller says.

Opinions among admissions experts vary on whether to write about the likely popular topic of the pandemic.

"If your essay communicates something positive, unique, and compelling about you in an interesting and eloquent way, go for it," Carolyn Pippen, principal college admissions counselor at IvyWise, wrote in an email. She adds that students shouldn't be dissuaded from writing about a topic merely because it's common, noting that "topics are bound to repeat, no matter how hard we try to avoid it."

Above all, she urges honesty.

"If your experience within the context of the pandemic has been truly unique, then write about that experience, and the standing out will take care of itself," Pippen says. "If your experience has been generally the same as most other students in your context, then trying to find a unique angle can easily cross the line into exploiting a tragedy, or at least appearing as though you have."

But focusing entirely on the pandemic can limit a student to a single story and narrow who they are in an application, Sawyer says. "There are so many wonderful possibilities for what you can say about yourself outside of your experience within the pandemic."

He notes that passions, strengths, career interests and personal identity are among the multitude of essay topic options available to applicants and encourages them to probe their values to help determine the topic that matters most to them – and write about it.

That doesn't mean the pandemic experience has to be ignored if applicants feel the need to write about it.

Writing About Coronavirus in Main and Supplemental Essays

Students can choose to write a full-length college essay on the coronavirus or summarize their experience in a shorter form.

To help students explain how the pandemic affected them, The Common App has added an optional section to address this topic. Applicants have 250 words to describe their pandemic experience and the personal and academic impact of COVID-19.

"That's not a trick question, and there's no right or wrong answer," Alexander says. Colleges want to know, he adds, how students navigated the pandemic, how they prioritized their time, what responsibilities they took on and what they learned along the way.

If students can distill all of the above information into 250 words, there's likely no need to write about it in a full-length college essay, experts say. And applicants whose lives were not heavily altered by the pandemic may even choose to skip the optional COVID-19 question.

"This space is best used to discuss hardship and/or significant challenges that the student and/or the student's family experienced as a result of COVID-19 and how they have responded to those difficulties," Miller notes. Using the section to acknowledge a lack of impact, she adds, "could be perceived as trite and lacking insight, despite the good intentions of the applicant."

To guard against this lack of awareness, Sawyer encourages students to tap someone they trust to review their writing , whether it's the 250-word Common App response or the full-length essay.

Experts tend to agree that the short-form approach to this as an essay topic works better, but there are exceptions. And if a student does have a coronavirus story that he or she feels must be told, Alexander encourages the writer to be authentic in the essay.

"My advice for an essay about COVID-19 is the same as my advice about an essay for any topic – and that is, don't write what you think we want to read or hear," Alexander says. "Write what really changed you and that story that now is yours and yours alone to tell."

Sawyer urges students to ask themselves, "What's the sentence that only I can write?" He also encourages students to remember that the pandemic is only a chapter of their lives and not the whole book.

Miller, who cautions against writing a full-length essay on the coronavirus, says that if students choose to do so they should have a conversation with their high school counselor about whether that's the right move. And if students choose to proceed with COVID-19 as a topic, she says they need to be clear, detailed and insightful about what they learned and how they adapted along the way.

"Approaching the essay in this manner will provide important balance while demonstrating personal growth and vulnerability," Miller says.

Pippen encourages students to remember that they are in an unprecedented time for college admissions.

"It is important to keep in mind with all of these (admission) factors that no colleges have ever had to consider them this way in the selection process, if at all," Pippen says. "They have had very little time to calibrate their evaluations of different application components within their offices, let alone across institutions. This means that colleges will all be handling the admissions process a little bit differently, and their approaches may even evolve over the course of the admissions cycle."

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• The positive effects...

The positive effects of covid-19

Read our latest coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.

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• Peer review
• Bryn Nelson , science journalist
• Seattle, WA, USA
• bdnelson{at}nasw.org

As the coronavirus pandemic continues its deadly path, dramatic changes in how people live are reducing some instances of other medical problems. Bryn Nelson writes that the irony may hold valuable lessons for public health

Doctors and researchers are noticing some curious and unexpectedly positive side effects of the abrupt shifts in human behaviour in response to the covid-19 pandemic. Skies are bluer, fewer cars are crashing, crime is falling, and some other infectious diseases are fading from hospital emergency departments.

Other changes are unquestionably troubling. American doctors have expressed alarm over a nosedive in patients presenting to emergency departments with heart attacks, strokes, and other conditions, leading to fears that patients are too afraid of contracting covid-19 to seek necessary medical care. 1 Calls to poison control centres are up by around 20%, attributed to a rise in accidents with cleaners and disinfectants even before President Trump questioned whether injected disinfectants might stop the virus. 2 Calls to suicide prevention lines are skyrocketing, while health experts are fretting about signs of rising alcohol and drug use, poorer diets, and a lack of exercise among those cooped-up at home. 3 Millions of people are hungry and unemployed.

But doctors, researchers, and public health officials say the pandemic is also providing a unique window through which to view some positive health effects from major changes in human behaviour. And the pandemic may lead to a public more willing to accept and act on public health messages.

Alice Pong, a paediatric infectious disease physician and the medical director for infection control at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego, California, said the hospital has seen a sharp decline in paediatric admissions for respiratory illnesses. These include diseases such as influenza, parainfluenza, respiratory syncytial virus, and human metapneumovirus.

“We track positive viral tests through our hospital lab and those numbers have gone down dramatically since everybody went into quarantine,” Pong told The BMJ . “We do think that’s a reflection of kids not being in day care or school.” The hospital is testing fewer patients, she said, which could be because more children might be staying home with respiratory symptoms. But more serious cases and intensive care unit admissions are down as well, suggesting a true decline in life threatening illnesses.

Beyond the disease reducing effects of social distancing, Pong said she believes children and families are taking advice on hand washing, personal hygiene, and other prevention measures seriously. “I think this is going to be a good lesson for everybody,” she said. ‘‘The public is seeing why public health officials have advised them stay home when they feel sick, for example, and why they’ve emphasised hand washing and covering a cough or sneeze. Kids growing up now will know this is how germs are spread,” Pong said. That message could spread to their families and broaden awareness.

Fewer cars, blue skies

With covid-19 shutting down economic activity in most parts of the world and people staying closer to home, street crimes like assault and robbery are down significantly, though domestic violence has increased. 4 Traffic has plummeted as well. As a result, NASA satellites have documented significant reductions in air pollution—20-30% in many cases—in major cities around the world. 5 Based on those declines, Marshall Burke, an environmental economist at Stanford University, predicted in a blog post that two months’ worth of improved air quality in China alone might save the lives of 4000 children under the age of 5 and 73 000 adults over the age of 70 (a more conservative calculation estimated about 50 000 saved lives). 6

Although baseline pollution levels in the US are lower, Burke said a similar 20-30% reduction in pollution would still likely yield significant health benefits. “A pandemic is a terrible way to improve environmental health,” he emphasised. It may, however, provide an unexpected vantage to help understand how environmental health can be altered. “It may help bring into focus the effect of business as usual on health outcomes that we care about,” he told The BMJ . “In some sense, it helps us imagine the future.” Getting there, he says, could instead come through better regulation and technology.

A separate report coauthored by Fraser Shilling, director of the Road Ecology Center at the University of California at Davis, found that highway accidents—including those involving an injury or fatality—fell by half after the state’s shelter-in-place order on 19 March. 7 “The reduction in traffic accidents is unparalleled,” and yielded an estimated $40m (£32m; €37m) in public savings every day, the report asserted.

Whereas average traffic speeds increased by only a few miles per hour, traffic volume fell by 55%. Hospitals in the Sacramento region reported fewer trauma related admissions while other reports indicated fewer car collisions with pedestrians and cyclists.

In Washington, collisions on state highways fell even further—by 62%—in the month after the state’s stay-at-home order went into effect on 23 March, compared with the previous year, according to the Washington State Patrol. The question, Shilling said, is whether researchers can learn from the information to design safer transportation patterns. “We’re not going to be guessing anymore about what happens when you take half the cars away,” he said.

Emptier highways, though, may be triggering reckless driving that could undo the mortality reductions. Washington State Patrol spokesperson Darren Wright said that troopers are seeing a “scary trend” of more drivers travelling at extreme speeds—a phenomenon also observed in Missouri. “We’re seeing speeds in the 120 and 130 miles per hour range,” Wright said. One motorcyclist was clocked at more than 150 miles per hour.

Reassessing priorities

If the pandemic has prompted risky behaviour for some, it has encouraged others to embrace preventive measures. Randy Mayer, chief of the Bureau of HIV, STD, and Hepatitis at the Iowa Department of Public Health, said the public has become more responsive to calls from the department’s partner services, which perform contact tracing for people who test positive for HIV, gonorrhoea, and syphilis. “People are really interested in calling us back and finding out what information we have for them,” he said. That increased cooperation, Mayer said, may be a benefit of people associating public health departments with trying to keep them safe from covid-19.

Even so, he worries that a noticeable reduction in the number of new HIV diagnoses may partially reflect a reduction in available testing with many clinics open for limited hours, if not completely closed. But growing evidence suggests that more people are also heeding recent pleas by public health officials and even dating apps to reduce the risk of covid-19 infection by avoiding casual sex with new partners. Researchers in Portugal and the UK told The BMJ that they were beginning to see shifts in the incidence of sexually transmitted infections but were still collecting data to support their observations.

Miguel Duarte Botas Alpalhão, a dermatovenereologist and invited lecturer in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Lisbon, said that he expects to see a lower rate of sexually transmitted infections during the lockdown. The crisis has caused people to question their priorities “and how much they are willing to give up to protect their lives and those of their loved ones,” he said. “People are now more aware that nothing really matters when health is lacking, and this raised awareness may be the driving force towards healthier habits. We will have to wait and see.”

Competing interests: I have read and understood BMJ policy on declaration of interests and have no relevant interests to declare.

• ↵ Grady D. The pandemic’s hidden victims: sick or dying, but not from the virus. New York Times. 20 April 2020. www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/health/treatment-delays-coronavirus.html .
• Schnall AH ,
• ↵ Bharath D. Suicide, help hotline calls soar in Southern California over coronavirus anxieties. Orange County Register. 19 April 2020. www.ocregister.com/2020/04/19/suicide-help-hotline-calls-soar-in-southern-california-over-coronavirus-anxieties .
• ↵ Dazio S, Briceno F, Tarm M. Crime drops around the world as covid-19 keeps people inside. Associated Press. 11 April 2020. https://apnews.com/bbb7adc88d3fa067c5c1b5c72a1a8aa6 .
• ↵ NASA. Airborne nitrogen dioxide plummets over China. 2 March 2020. www.earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/146362/airborne-nitrogen-dioxide-plummets-over-china .
• ↵ Burke M. Covid-19 reduces economic activity, which reduces pollution, which saves lives. G-FEED.org. 8 March 2020. www.g-feed.com/2020/03/covid-19-reduces-economic-activity.html .
• ↵ Shilling F, Waetjen D. Special report (update): impact of covid-19 mitigation on numbers and costs of California traffic crashes. 15 April 2020. https://roadecology.ucdavis.edu/files/content/projects/COVID_CHIPs_Impacts_updated_415.pdf .

Read these 12 moving essays about life during coronavirus

Artists, novelists, critics, and essayists are writing the first draft of history.

by Alissa Wilkinson

The world is grappling with an invisible, deadly enemy, trying to understand how to live with the threat posed by a virus . For some writers, the only way forward is to put pen to paper, trying to conceptualize and document what it feels like to continue living as countries are under lockdown and regular life seems to have ground to a halt.

So as the coronavirus pandemic has stretched around the world, it’s sparked a crop of diary entries and essays that describe how life has changed. Novelists, critics, artists, and journalists have put words to the feelings many are experiencing. The result is a first draft of how we’ll someday remember this time, filled with uncertainty and pain and fear as well as small moments of hope and humanity.

• The Vox guide to navigating the coronavirus crisis

At the New York Review of Books, Ali Bhutto writes that in Karachi, Pakistan, the government-imposed curfew due to the virus is “eerily reminiscent of past military clampdowns”:

Beneath the quiet calm lies a sense that society has been unhinged and that the usual rules no longer apply. Small groups of pedestrians look on from the shadows, like an audience watching a spectacle slowly unfolding. People pause on street corners and in the shade of trees, under the watchful gaze of the paramilitary forces and the police.

His essay concludes with the sobering note that “in the minds of many, Covid-19 is just another life-threatening hazard in a city that stumbles from one crisis to another.”

Writing from Chattanooga, novelist Jamie Quatro documents the mixed ways her neighbors have been responding to the threat, and the frustration of conflicting direction, or no direction at all, from local, state, and federal leaders:

Whiplash, trying to keep up with who’s ordering what. We’re already experiencing enough chaos without this back-and-forth. Why didn’t the federal government issue a nationwide shelter-in-place at the get-go, the way other countries did? What happens when one state’s shelter-in-place ends, while others continue? Do states still under quarantine close their borders? We  are  still one nation, not fifty individual countries. Right?

• A syllabus for the end of the world

Award-winning photojournalist Alessio Mamo, quarantined with his partner Marta in Sicily after she tested positive for the virus, accompanies his photographs in the Guardian of their confinement with a reflection on being confined :

The doctors asked me to take a second test, but again I tested negative. Perhaps I’m immune? The days dragged on in my apartment, in black and white, like my photos. Sometimes we tried to smile, imagining that I was asymptomatic, because I was the virus. Our smiles seemed to bring good news. My mother left hospital, but I won’t be able to see her for weeks. Marta started breathing well again, and so did I. I would have liked to photograph my country in the midst of this emergency, the battles that the doctors wage on the frontline, the hospitals pushed to their limits, Italy on its knees fighting an invisible enemy. That enemy, a day in March, knocked on my door instead.

In the New York Times Magazine, deputy editor Jessica Lustig writes with devastating clarity about her family’s life in Brooklyn while her husband battled the virus, weeks before most people began taking the threat seriously:

At the door of the clinic, we stand looking out at two older women chatting outside the doorway, oblivious. Do I wave them away? Call out that they should get far away, go home, wash their hands, stay inside? Instead we just stand there, awkwardly, until they move on. Only then do we step outside to begin the long three-block walk home. I point out the early magnolia, the forsythia. T says he is cold. The untrimmed hairs on his neck, under his beard, are white. The few people walking past us on the sidewalk don’t know that we are visitors from the future. A vision, a premonition, a walking visitation. This will be them: Either T, in the mask, or — if they’re lucky — me, tending to him.

Essayist Leslie Jamison writes in the New York Review of Books about being shut away alone in her New York City apartment with her 2-year-old daughter since she became sick:

The virus.  Its sinewy, intimate name. What does it feel like in my body today? Shivering under blankets. A hot itch behind the eyes. Three sweatshirts in the middle of the day. My daughter trying to pull another blanket over my body with her tiny arms. An ache in the muscles that somehow makes it hard to lie still. This loss of taste has become a kind of sensory quarantine. It’s as if the quarantine keeps inching closer and closer to my insides. First I lost the touch of other bodies; then I lost the air; now I’ve lost the taste of bananas. Nothing about any of these losses is particularly unique. I’ve made a schedule so I won’t go insane with the toddler. Five days ago, I wrote  Walk/Adventure!  on it, next to a cut-out illustration of a tiger—as if we’d see tigers on our walks. It was good to keep possibility alive.

At Literary Hub, novelist Heidi Pitlor writes about the elastic nature of time during her family’s quarantine in Massachusetts:

During a shutdown, the things that mark our days—commuting to work, sending our kids to school, having a drink with friends—vanish and time takes on a flat, seamless quality. Without some self-imposed structure, it’s easy to feel a little untethered. A friend recently posted on Facebook: “For those who have lost track, today is Blursday the fortyteenth of Maprilay.” ... Giving shape to time is especially important now, when the future is so shapeless. We do not know whether the virus will continue to rage for weeks or months or, lord help us, on and off for years. We do not know when we will feel safe again. And so many of us, minus those who are gifted at compartmentalization or denial, remain largely captive to fear. We may stay this way if we do not create at least the illusion of movement in our lives, our long days spent with ourselves or partners or families.

• What day is it today?

Novelist Lauren Groff writes at the New York Review of Books about trying to escape the prison of her fears while sequestered at home in Gainesville, Florida:

Some people have imaginations sparked only by what they can see; I blame this blinkered empiricism for the parks overwhelmed with people, the bars, until a few nights ago, thickly thronged. My imagination is the opposite. I fear everything invisible to me. From the enclosure of my house, I am afraid of the suffering that isn’t present before me, the people running out of money and food or drowning in the fluid in their lungs, the deaths of health-care workers now growing ill while performing their duties. I fear the federal government, which the right wing has so—intentionally—weakened that not only is it insufficient to help its people, it is actively standing in help’s way. I fear we won’t sufficiently punish the right. I fear leaving the house and spreading the disease. I fear what this time of fear is doing to my children, their imaginations, and their souls.

At ArtForum , Berlin-based critic and writer Kristian Vistrup Madsen reflects on martinis, melancholia, and Finnish artist Jaakko Pallasvuo’s 2018 graphic novel  Retreat , in which three young people exile themselves in the woods:

In melancholia, the shape of what is ending, and its temporality, is sprawling and incomprehensible. The ambivalence makes it hard to bear. The world of  Retreat  is rendered in lush pink and purple watercolors, which dissolve into wild and messy abstractions. In apocalypse, the divisions established in genesis bleed back out. My own Corona-retreat is similarly soft, color-field like, each day a blurred succession of quarantinis, YouTube–yoga, and televized press conferences. As restrictions mount, so does abstraction. For now, I’m still rooting for love to save the world.

At the Paris Review , Matt Levin writes about reading Virginia Woolf’s novel The Waves during quarantine:

A retreat, a quarantine, a sickness—they simultaneously distort and clarify, curtail and expand. It is an ideal state in which to read literature with a reputation for difficulty and inaccessibility, those hermetic books shorn of the handholds of conventional plot or characterization or description. A novel like Virginia Woolf’s  The Waves  is perfect for the state of interiority induced by quarantine—a story of three men and three women, meeting after the death of a mutual friend, told entirely in the overlapping internal monologues of the six, interspersed only with sections of pure, achingly beautiful descriptions of the natural world, a day’s procession and recession of light and waves. The novel is, in my mind’s eye, a perfectly spherical object. It is translucent and shimmering and infinitely fragile, prone to shatter at the slightest disturbance. It is not a book that can be read in snatches on the subway—it demands total absorption. Though it revels in a stark emotional nakedness, the book remains aloof, remote in its own deep self-absorption.

• Vox is starting a book club. Come read with us!

In an essay for the Financial Times, novelist Arundhati Roy writes with anger about Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s anemic response to the threat, but also offers a glimmer of hope for the future:

Historically, pandemics have forced humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew. This one is no different. It is a portal, a gateway between one world and the next. We can choose to walk through it, dragging the carcasses of our prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data banks and dead ideas, our dead rivers and smoky skies behind us. Or we can walk through lightly, with little luggage, ready to imagine another world. And ready to fight for it. 

From Boston, Nora Caplan-Bricker writes in The Point about the strange contraction of space under quarantine, in which a friend in Beirut is as close as the one around the corner in the same city:

It’s a nice illusion—nice to feel like we’re in it together, even if my real world has shrunk to one person, my husband, who sits with his laptop in the other room. It’s nice in the same way as reading those essays that reframe social distancing as solidarity. “We must begin to see the negative space as clearly as the positive, to know what we  don’t do  is also brilliant and full of love,” the poet Anne Boyer wrote on March 10th, the day that Massachusetts declared a state of emergency. If you squint, you could almost make sense of this quarantine as an effort to flatten, along with the curve, the distinctions we make between our bonds with others. Right now, I care for my neighbor in the same way I demonstrate love for my mother: in all instances, I stay away. And in moments this month, I have loved strangers with an intensity that is new to me. On March 14th, the Saturday night after the end of life as we knew it, I went out with my dog and found the street silent: no lines for restaurants, no children on bicycles, no couples strolling with little cups of ice cream. It had taken the combined will of thousands of people to deliver such a sudden and complete emptiness. I felt so grateful, and so bereft.

And on his own website, musician and artist David Byrne writes about rediscovering the value of working for collective good , saying that “what is happening now is an opportunity to learn how to change our behavior”:

In emergencies, citizens can suddenly cooperate and collaborate. Change can happen. We’re going to need to work together as the effects of climate change ramp up. In order for capitalism to survive in any form, we will have to be a little more socialist. Here is an opportunity for us to see things differently — to see that we really are all connected — and adjust our behavior accordingly.  Are we willing to do this? Is this moment an opportunity to see how truly interdependent we all are? To live in a world that is different and better than the one we live in now? We might be too far down the road to test every asymptomatic person, but a change in our mindsets, in how we view our neighbors, could lay the groundwork for the collective action we’ll need to deal with other global crises. The time to see how connected we all are is now.

The portrait these writers paint of a world under quarantine is multifaceted. Our worlds have contracted to the confines of our homes, and yet in some ways we’re more connected than ever to one another. We feel fear and boredom, anger and gratitude, frustration and strange peace. Uncertainty drives us to find metaphors and images that will let us wrap our minds around what is happening.

Yet there’s no single “what” that is happening. Everyone is contending with the pandemic and its effects from different places and in different ways. Reading others’ experiences — even the most frightening ones — can help alleviate the loneliness and dread, a little, and remind us that what we’re going through is both unique and shared by all.

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Writing about COVID-19 in a college admission essay

by: Venkates Swaminathan | Updated: September 14, 2020

Print article

For students applying to college using the CommonApp, there are several different places where students and counselors can address the pandemic’s impact. The different sections have differing goals. You must understand how to use each section for its appropriate use.

The CommonApp COVID-19 question

First, the CommonApp this year has an additional question specifically about COVID-19 :

Community disruptions such as COVID-19 and natural disasters can have deep and long-lasting impacts. If you need it, this space is yours to describe those impacts. Colleges care about the effects on your health and well-being, safety, family circumstances, future plans, and education, including access to reliable technology and quiet study spaces. Please use this space to describe how these events have impacted you.

This question seeks to understand the adversity that students may have had to face due to the pandemic, the move to online education, or the shelter-in-place rules. You don’t have to answer this question if the impact on you wasn’t particularly severe. Some examples of things students should discuss include:

• The student or a family member had COVID-19 or suffered other illnesses due to confinement during the pandemic.
• The candidate had to deal with personal or family issues, such as abusive living situations or other safety concerns
• The student suffered from a lack of internet access and other online learning challenges.
• Students who dealt with problems registering for or taking standardized tests and AP exams.

Jeff Schiffman of the Tulane University admissions office has a blog about this section. He recommends students ask themselves several questions as they go about answering this section:

• Are my experiences different from others’?
• Are there noticeable changes on my transcript?
• Am I aware of my privilege?
• Am I specific? Am I explaining rather than complaining?
• Is this information being included elsewhere on my application?

If you do answer this section, be brief and to-the-point.

Counselor recommendations and school profiles

Second, counselors will, in their counselor forms and school profiles on the CommonApp, address how the school handled the pandemic and how it might have affected students, specifically as it relates to:

• Grading scales and policies
• Graduation requirements
• Instructional methods
• Schedules and course offerings
• Testing requirements
• Your academic calendar
• Other extenuating circumstances

Students don’t have to mention these matters in their application unless something unusual happened.

Writing about COVID-19 in your main essay

Write about your experiences during the pandemic in your main college essay if your experience is personal, relevant, and the most important thing to discuss in your college admission essay. That you had to stay home and study online isn’t sufficient, as millions of other students faced the same situation. But sometimes, it can be appropriate and helpful to write about something related to the pandemic in your essay. For example:

• One student developed a website for a local comic book store. The store might not have survived without the ability for people to order comic books online. The student had a long-standing relationship with the store, and it was an institution that created a community for students who otherwise felt left out.
• One student started a YouTube channel to help other students with academic subjects he was very familiar with and began tutoring others.
• Some students used their extra time that was the result of the stay-at-home orders to take online courses pursuing topics they are genuinely interested in or developing new interests, like a foreign language or music.

Experiences like this can be good topics for the CommonApp essay as long as they reflect something genuinely important about the student. For many students whose lives have been shaped by this pandemic, it can be a critical part of their college application.

Want more? Read 6 ways to improve a college essay , What the &%$! should I write about in my college essay , and Just how important is a college admissions essay? .

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• Published: 27 January 2021

The effects of social isolation on well-being and life satisfaction during pandemic

• Ruta Clair   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9828-9911 1 ,
• Maya Gordon 1 ,
• Matthew Kroon 1 &
• Carolyn Reilly 1  

Humanities and Social Sciences Communications volume  8 , Article number:  28 ( 2021 ) Cite this article

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• Health humanities

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic placed many locations under ‘stay at home” orders and adults simultaneously underwent a form of social isolation that is unprecedented in the modern world. Perceived social isolation can have a significant effect on health and well-being. Further, one can live with others and still experience perceived social isolation. However, there is limited research on psychological well-being during a pandemic. In addition, much of the research is limited to older adult samples. This study examined the effects of perceived social isolation in adults across the age span. Specifically, this study documented the prevalence of social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the various factors that contribute to individuals of all ages feeling more or less isolated while they are required to maintain physical distancing for an extended period of time. Survey data was collected from 309 adults who ranged in age from 18 to 84. The measure consisted of a 42 item survey from the Revised UCLA Loneliness Scale, Measures of Social Isolation (Zavaleta et al., 2017 ), and items specifically about the pandemic and demographics. Items included both Likert scale items and open-ended questions. A “snowball” data collection process was used to build the sample. While the entire sample reported at least some perceived social isolation, young adults reported the highest levels of isolation, χ 2 (2) = 27.36, p  < 0.001. Perceived social isolation was associated with poor life satisfaction across all domains, as well as work-related stress, and lower trust of institutions. Higher levels of substance use as a coping strategy was also related to higher perceived social isolation. Respondents reporting higher levels of subjective personal risk for COVID-19 also reported higher perceived social isolation. The experience of perceived social isolation has significant negative consequences related to psychological well-being.

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Introduction.

In March 2020, the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a global pandemic, prompting most governors in the United States to issue stay-at-home orders in an effort to minimize the spread of COVID-19. This was after several months of similar quarantine orders in countries throughout Asia and Europe. As a result, a unique situation arose, in which most of the world’s population was confined to their homes, with only medical staff and other essential workers being allowed to leave their homes on a regular basis. Several studies of previous quarantine episodes have shown that psychological stress reactions may emerge from the experience of physical and social isolation (Brooks et al., 2020 ). In addition to the stress that might arise with social isolation or being restricted to your home, there is also the stress of worrying about contracting COVID-19 and losing loved ones to the disease (Brooks et al., 2020 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ). For many families, this stress is compounded by the challenge of working from home while also caring for children whose schools had been closed in an effort to slow the spread of the disease. While the effects of social isolation has been reported in the literature, little is known about the effects of social isolation during a global pandemic (Galea et al., 2020 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ; Usher et al., 2020 ).

Social isolation is a multi-dimensional construct that can be defined as the inadequate quantity and/or quality of interactions with other people, including those interactions that occur at the individual, group, and/or community level (Nicholson, 2012 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ; Umberson and Karas Montez, 2010 ; Zavaleta et al., 2017 ). Some measures of social isolation focus on external isolation which refers to the frequency of contact or interactions with other people. Other measures focus on internal or perceived social isolation which refers to the person’s perceptions of loneliness, trust, and satisfaction with their relationships. This distinction is important because a person can have the subjective experience of being isolated even when they have frequent contact with other people and conversely they may not feel isolated even when their contact with others is limited (Hughes et al., 2004 ).

When considering the effects of social isolation, it is important to note that the majority of the existing research has focused on the elderly population (Nyqvist et al., 2016 ). This is likely because older adulthood is a time when external isolation is more likely due to various circumstances such as retirement, and limited physical mobility (Umberson and Karas Montez, 2010 ). During the COVID-19 pandemic the need for physical distancing due to virus mitigation efforts has exacerbated the isolation of many older adults (Berg-Weger and Morley, 2020 ; Smith et al., 2020 ) and has exposed younger adults to a similar experience (Brooks et al., 2020 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ). Notably, a few studies have found that young adults report higher levels of loneliness (perceived social isolation) even though their social networks are larger (Child and Lawton, 2019 ; Nyqvist et al., 2016 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ); thus indicating that age may be an important factor to consider in determining how long-term distancing due to COVID-19 will influence people’s perceptions of being socially isolated.

The general pattern in this research is that increased social isolation is associated with decreased life satisfaction, higher levels of depression, and lower levels of psychological well-being (Cacioppo and Cacioppo, 2014 ; Coutin and Knapp, 2017 ; Dahlberg and McKee, 2018 ; Harasemiw et al., 2018 ; Lee and Cagle, 2018 ; Usher et al., 2020 ). Individuals who experience high levels of social isolation may engage in self-protective thinking that can lead to a negative outlook impacting the way individuals interact with others (Cacioppo and Cacioppo, 2014 ). Further, restricting social networks and experiencing elevated levels of social isolation act as mediators that result in elevated negative mood and lower satisfaction with life factors (Harasemiw et al., 2018 ; Zheng et al., 2020 ). The relationship between well-being and feelings of control and satisfaction with one’s environment are related to psychological health (Zheng et al., 2020 ). Dissatisfaction with one’s home, resource scarcity such as food and self-care products, and job instability contribute to social isolation and poor well-being (Zavaleta et al., 2017 ).

Although there are fewer studies with young and middle aged adults, there is some evidence of a similar pattern of greater isolation being associated with negative psychological outcomes for this population (Bergin and Pakenham, 2015 ; Elphinstone, 2018 ; Liu et al., 2019 ; Nicholson, 2012 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ; Usher et al., 2020 ). There is also considerable evidence that social isolation can have a detrimental impact on physical health (Holt-Lunstad et al., 2010 ; Steptoe et al., 2013 ). In a meta-analysis of 148 studies examining connections between social relationships and risk of mortality, Holt-Lunstad et al. ( 2010 ) concluded that the influence of social relationships on the risk for death is comparable to the risk caused by other factors like smoking and alcohol use, and greater than the risk associated with obesity and lack of exercise. Likewise, other researchers have highlighted the detrimental impact of social isolation and loneliness on various illnesses, including cardiovascular, inflammatory, neuroendocrine, and cognitive disorders (Bhatti and Haq, 2017 ; Xia and Li, 2018 ). Understanding behavioral factors related to positive and negative copings is essential in providing health guidance to adult populations.

Feelings of belonging and social connection are related to life satisfaction in older adults (Hawton et al., 2011 ; Mellor et al., 2008 ; Nicholson, 2012 ; Victor et al., 2000 ; Xia and Li, 2018 ). While physical distancing initiatives were implemented to save lives by reducing the spread of COVID-19, these results suggest that social isolation can have a negative impact on both mental and physical health that may linger beyond the mitigation orders (Berg-Weger and Morley, 2020 ; Brooks et al., 2020 ; Cava et al., 2005 ; Smith et al., 2020 ; Usher et al., 2020 ). It is therefore important that we document the prevalence of social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the various factors that contribute to individuals of all ages feeling more or less isolated, while they are required to maintain physical distancing for an extended period of time. It was hypothesized that perceived social isolation would not be limited to an older adult population. Further, it was hypothesized that perceived social isolation would be related to individual’s coping with the pandemic. Finally, it was hypothesized that the experience of social isolation would act as a mediator to life satisfaction and basic trust in institutions for individuals across the adult lifespan. The current study was designed to examine the following research questions:

Are there age differences in participants’ perceived social isolation?

Do factors like time spent under required distancing and worry about personal risk for illness have an association with perceived social isolation?

Is perceived social isolation due to quarantine and pandemic mitigation efforts related to life satisfaction?

Is there an association between perceived social isolation and trust of institutions?

Is there a difference in basic stressors and coping during the pandemic for individuals experiencing varying levels of perceived social isolation?

Participants

Participants were adults age 18 years and above. Individuals younger than 18 years were not eligible to participate in the study. There were no limitations on occupation, education, or time under mandatory “stay at home” orders. The researchers sought a sample of adults that was diverse by age, occupation, and ethnicity. The researchers sought a broad sample that would allow researchers to conduct a descriptive quantitative survey study examining factors related to perceived social isolation during the first months of the COVID-19 mitigation efforts.

Participants were asked to complete a 42-item electronic survey that consisted of both Likert-type items and open-ended questions. There were 20 Likert scale items, 3 items on a 3-point scale (1 = Hardly ever to 3 = Often) and 17 items on a 5-point scale (1 = Not at all satisfied to 4 = very satisfied, 0 = I don’t know), 11 multiple choice items, one of which had an available short response answer, and 11 short answer items.

Items were selected from Measures of Social Isolation (Zavaleta et al., 2017 ) that included 27 items to measure feelings of social isolation through the proxy variables of stress, trust, and life satisfaction. Trust was measured for government, business, and media. Life satisfaction examined overall feelings of satisfaction as well as satisfaction with resources such as food, housing, work, and relationships. Three items related to social isolation were chosen from the Revised UCLA Loneliness Scale. Hughes et al. ( 2004 ) reported that these three items showed good psychometric validity and reliability for the construct of Loneliness.

There were a further 12 items from the authors specifically about circumstances regarding COVID-19 at the time of the survey. Participants answered questions about the length of time spent distancing from others, level of compliance with local regulations, primary news sources, whether physical distancing was voluntary or mandatory, how many people are in their household, work availability, methods of communication, feelings of personal risk of contracting COVID-19, possible changes in behavior, coping methods, stressors, and whether there are children over the age of 18 staying in the home.

This study was submitted to the Cabrini University Institutional Review Board and approval was obtained in March 2020. Researchers recruited a sample of people that varied by age, gender, and ethnicity by identifying potential participants across academic and non-academic settings using professional contact lists. A “snowball” approach to data gathering was used. The researchers sent the survey to a broad group of adults and requested that the participants send the survey to others they felt would be interested in taking part in research. Recipients received an email that contained a description of the purpose of the study and how the data would be used. Included at the end of the email was a link to the online survey that first presented the study’s consent form. Participants acknowledged informed consent and agreed to participate by opening and completing the survey.

At the end of the survey, participants were given the opportunity to supply an email to participate in a longitudinal study which consists of completing surveys at later dates. In addition, the sample was asked to forward the survey to their contacts who might be interested. Overall, the study took ~10 min to complete.

Demographics

Participants were 309 adults who ranged in age from 18 to 84 ( M  = 38.54, s  = 18.27). Data was collected beginning in 2020 from late March until early April. At the time of data collection distancing mandates were in place for 64.7% and voluntary for 34.6% of the sample, while 0.6% lived in places which had not yet outlined any pandemic mitigation policies. The average length of time distancing was slightly more than 2 weeks ( M  = 14.91 days, s  = 4.5) with 30 days as the longest reported time.

The sample identified mostly as female (80.3%), with males (17.8%) and those who preferred not to answer (1.9%) representing smaller numbers. The majority of the sample identified as Caucasian (71.5%). Other ethnic identities reported by participants included Hispanic/Latinx, African-American/Black, Asian/East Asian, Jewish/Jewish White-Passing, Multiracial/Multiethnic, and Country of Origin (Table 1 ). Individuals resided in the United States and Europe.

The majority of the sample lived in households with others (Fig. 1 ). More than one-third (36.7%) lived with one other person, 19.7% lived with two others, and 21% lived with three other people. People living alone comprised 12.1% of the sample. When asked about the presence of children under 18 years of age in the home, 20.5% answered yes.

Figure shows how many additional individuals live in the participant’s household in March 2020.

The highest level of education attained ranged from completion of lower secondary school (0.3%) to doctoral level (6.8%). Two thirds of the sample consisted of individuals with a Bachelor’s degree or above (Table 2 ).

Participants were asked to provide their occupation. The largest group identified themselves as professionals (26.5%), while 38.6% reported their field of work (Table 3 ). Students comprised 23.1% of the sample, while 11.1% reported that they were retired. Some of the occupations reported by the sample included nurses and physicians, lawyers, psychologists, teachers, mental health professionals, retail sales, government work, homemakers, artists across types of media, financial analysts, hairdresser, and veterinary support personnel. One person indicated that they were unemployed prior to the pandemic.

Social isolation and demographics

Spearman’s rank-order correlations were used to examine relationships between the three Likert scale items from the Revised UCLA Loneliness Scale that measure social isolation. Feeling isolated from others was significantly correlated with lacking companionship ( r s = 0.45, p  < 0.001) and feeling left out ( r s = 0.43, p  < 0.001). The items related to lacking companionship and feeling left out were also significantly correlated ( r s = 0.39, p  < 0.001).

Kruskal–Wallis tests were conducted to determine if the variables of time in required distancing and age were each related to the three levels of social isolation (hardly, sometimes, often). There were no significant findings between perceived social isolation and length of time in required distancing, χ 2 (2) = 0.024, p  = 0.98.

A significant relationship was found between perceived social isolation and age, χ 2 (2) = 27.36, p  < 0.001). Subsequently, pairwise comparisons were performed using Dunn’s procedure with a Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons. Adjusted p values are presented. Post hoc analysis revealed statistically significant differences in age between those with high levels of social isolation (Mdn = 25) and some social isolation (Mdn = 31) ( p  = <0.001) and low isolation (Mdn = 46) ( p  = 0.002). Higher levels of social isolation were associated with younger age.

Age was then grouped (18–29, 30–49, 50–69, 70+) and a significant relationship was found between social isolation and age, χ 2 (3) = 13.78, p  = 0.003). Post hoc analysis revealed statistically significant differences in perceived social isolation across age groups. The youngest adults (age 18–29) reported significantly higher social isolation (Mdn = 2.4) than the two oldest groups (50–69 year olds: Mdn = 1.6, p  = 004); age 70 and above: Mdn = 1.57), p  = 0.01). The difference between the youngest adults and the next youngest (30–49) was not significant ( p  = 0.09).

When asked if participants feel personally at risk for contracting SARS-CoV-2 61.2% reported that they feel at risk. A Mann–Whitney U test was conducted to compare social isolation experienced by those who reported feeling at risk and those who did not feel at risk. Individuals who feel at risk for infection reported more social isolation (Mdn = 2.0) than those that do not feel at risk (Mdn = 1.75), U  = 9377, z  = −2.43, p  = 0.015.

Social isolation and life satisfaction

The relationship between level of social isolation and overall life satisfaction were examined using Kruskal–Wallis tests as the measure consisted of Likert-type items (Table 4 ).

Overall life satisfaction was significantly lower for those who reported greater social isolation ( χ 2 (2) = 50.56, p  < 0.001). Post hoc analysis revealed statistically significant differences in life satisfaction scores between those with high levels of social isolation (Mdn = 2.82) and some social isolation (Mdn = 3.04) ( p  ≤ 0.001) and between high and low isolation (Mdn = 3.47) ( p  ≤ 0.001), but not between high levels of social isolation and some social isolation ( p  = 0.09).

The pandemic added concern about access to resources such as food and 68% of the sample reported stress related to availability of resources. A significant relationship was found between social isolation and satisfaction with access to food, χ 2 (2) = 21.92, p  < 0.001). Individuals reporting high levels of social isolation were the least satisfied with their food situation. Statistical difference were evident between high social isolation (Mdn = 3.28) and some social isolation (Mdn = 3.46) ( p  = 0.003) and between high and low isolation (Mdn = 3.69) ( p  < 0.001). Reporting higher levels of social isolation is associated with lower satisfaction with food.

As a result of stay at home orders, many participants were spending more time in their residences than prior to the pandemic. A significant relationship was found between social isolation and housing satisfaction, χ 2 (2) = 10.33, p  = 0.006). Post hoc analysis revealed statistically a significant difference in housing satisfaction between those with high levels of social isolation (Mdn = 3.49) and low social isolation (Mdn = 3.75) ( p  = 0.006). Higher levels of social isolation is associated with lower levels of satisfaction with housing.

Work life changed for many participants and 22% of participants reported job loss as a result of the pandemic. A significant relationship was found between social isolation and work satisfaction, χ 2 (2) = 21.40, p  < 0.001). Post hoc analysis revealed individuals reporting high social isolation reported much lower satisfaction with work (Mdn = 2.53) than did those reporting low social isolation (Mdn = 3.27) ( p  < 0.001) and moderate social isolation (Mdn = 3.03) ( p  = 0.003).

Social isolation and trust of institutions

The relationship between social isolation and connection to community was measured using a Kruskal–Wallis test. A significant relationship was found between feelings of social isolation and connection to community ( χ 2 (2) = 13.97, p  = 0.001. Post hoc analysis revealed a statistically significant difference in connection to community such that the group reporting higher social isolation (Mdn = 2.27, p  = 0.001) reports less connection to their community than the group reporting low social isolation (Mdn = 2.93).

A significant relationship was found between social isolation and trust of central government institutions, χ 2 (2) = 10.46, p  = 0.005). Post hoc analysis revealed a statistically significant difference in trust of central government between individuals reporting low social isolation (Mdn = 2.91) and those reporting high social isolation (Mdn = 2.32) ( p  = 0.008) and moderate social isolation (Mdn = 2.48) ( p  = 0.03). There was less trust of central government for the group reporting high social isolation. However, distrust of central government did not extend to local government institutions. There was no significant difference in trust of local government for low, moderate, and high social isolation groups, χ 2 (2) = 5.92, p  = 0.052.

Trust levels of business was significantly different between groups that differed in feelings of social isolation, χ 2 (2) = 9.58, p  = 0.008). Post hoc analysis revealed more trust of business institutions for the low social isolation group (Mdn = 3.10) compared to the group reporting high social isolation (Mdn = 2.62) ( p  = 0.007).

Sixty-seven participants reported loss of a job as a result of COVID-19. A Mann–Whitney U test was conducted to compare social isolation experienced by those who had lost their job to those who had not. Individuals who experienced job loss reported more social isolation (Mdn = 2.26) than those that did not lose their job (Mdn = 1.80), U  = 5819.5, z  = −3.66 , p  < 0.001.

Stress related to caring for an elderly family member was identified by 12% of the sample. A Mann–Whitney U test was conducted to compare social isolation experienced by those who reported that caring for an elderly family member is a stressor to those who had not. There was no significant finding, U  = 4483, z  = −1.28, p  = 0.20. Similarly, there was no significant effect for caring for a child, U  = 3568.5, z  = −0.48, p  = 0.63.

Coping strategies

Participants were asked to check off whether they were using virtual communication, exercise, going outdoors, and/or substances in order to cope with the challenges of distancing during pandemic. A Mann–Whitney U test was conducted to compare social isolation experienced by those who used substances as a coping strategy and those that did not. Individuals who reported substance use reported more social isolation (Mdn = 2.12) than those that did not (Mdn = 1.80), U  = 6724, z  = −2.01, p  = 0.04.

There was no significant difference on Mann–Whitney U test for social isolation between those individuals who went outdoors to cope with pandemic versus those that did not, U  = 5416, z  = −0.72, p  = 0.47. Similarly, there was no difference in social isolation between those individuals who used exercise as a coping tool and those that did not. Finally, there was no difference in social isolation between those that used virtual communication tools and those that did not, U  = 7839.5, z  = −0.56, p  = 0.58. The only coping strategy which was significantly associated with social isolation was substance use.

While research has explored the subjective experience of social isolation, the novel experience of mass physical distancing as a result of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic suggests that social isolation is a significant factor in the public health crisis. The experience of social isolation has been examined in older populations but less often in middle-age and younger adults (Brooks et al., 2020 ; Smith and Lim, 2020 ). Perceived social isolation is related to numerous negative outcomes related to both physical and mental health (Bhatti and Haq, 2017 ; Holt-Lunstad et al., 2010 , Victor et al., 2000 ; Xia and Li, 2018 ). Our findings indicate that younger adults in their 20s reported more social isolation than did those individuals aged 50 and older during physical distancing. This supports the findings of Nyqvist et al. ( 2016 ) that found teenagers and young adults in Finland reported greater loneliness than did older adults.

The experience of social isolation is related to a reduction in life satisfaction. Previous research has shown that feelings of social connection are related to general life satisfaction in older adults (Hawton et al., 2011 , Hughes et al., 2004 , Mellor et al., 2008 ; Victor et al., 2000 , Xia and Li, 2018 ). These findings indicate that perceived social isolation can be a significant mediator in life satisfaction and well-being across the adult lifespan during a global health crisis. Individuals reporting higher levels of social isolation experience less satisfaction with the conditions in their home.

During mandated “stay-at-home” conditions, the experience of work changed for many people. For many adults work is an essential aspect of identity and life satisfaction. The experience of individuals reporting elevated social isolation was also related to lower satisfaction with work. This study included a wide span of occupations involving both individuals required to work from home and essential workers continuing to work outside the home. Further, ~22% of the sample ( n  = 67) reported job loss as a stressor related to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and reported elevated social isolation. As institutions and businesses consider whether remote work is an economically viable alternative to face-to-face offices once physical distancing mandates are ended, the needs of workers for social interaction should be considered.

Further, individuals reporting higher social isolation also indicated less connection to their community and lower satisfaction with environmental factors such as housing and food. Findings indicate that higher perceived social isolation is associated with broad dissatisfaction across social and life domains and perceptions of personal risk from COVID-19. This supports research that identified a relationship between social isolation and health-related quality of life outcomes (Hawton et al., 2011 , Victor et al., 2000 ). Perceptions of elevated social isolation are related to lower life satisfaction in functional and social domains.

Perceived social isolation is likewise related to trust of some institutions. While there was no effect for local government, individuals with higher perceived social isolation reported less trust of central government and of business. There is an association between higher levels of perceived social isolation and less connection to the community, lower life satisfaction, and less trust of large-scale institutions such as central government and businesses. As a result, the individuals who need the most support may be the most suspicious of the effectiveness of those institutions.

Coping strategies related to exercise, time spent outdoors, and virtual communication were not related to social isolation. However, individuals who reported using substances as a coping strategy reported significantly higher social isolation than did the group who did not indicate substance use as a coping strategy. Perceived social isolation was associated with negative coping rather than positive coping. This study shows that clinicians and health care providers should ask about coping strategies in order to provide effective supports for individuals.

There are several limitations that may limit the generalizability of the findings. The study is heavily female and this may have an effect on findings. In addition, the majority of the sample has a post-secondary degree and, as such, this study may not accurately reflect the broad experience of individuals during pandemic. Further, it cannot be ruled out that individuals reporting high levels of perceived social isolation may have experienced some social isolation prior to the pandemic.

Conclusions

In conclusion, this study suggests that perceived social isolation is a significant element of health-related quality of life during pandemic. Perceived social isolation is not just an issue for older adults. Indeed, young adults appear to be suffering greatly from the distancing required to reduce the spread of SARS-CoV-2. The experience of social isolation is associated with poor life satisfaction across domains, work-related stress, lower trust of institutions such as central government and business, perceived personal risk for COVID-19, and higher levels of use of substances as a coping strategy. Measuring the degree of perceived social isolation is an important addition to wellness assessments. Stress and social isolation can impact health and immune function and so reducing perceived social isolation is essential during a time when individuals require strong immune function to fight off a novel virus. Further, it is anticipated that these widespread effects may linger as the uncertainty of the virus continues. As a result, we plan to follow participants for at least a year to examine the impact of SARS-CoV-2 on the well-being of adults.

Data availability

The dataset generated during and analyzed during the current study is not publicly available due to ethical restrictions and privacy agreements between the authors and participants.

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Clair, R., Gordon, M., Kroon, M. et al. The effects of social isolation on well-being and life satisfaction during pandemic. Humanit Soc Sci Commun 8 , 28 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-021-00710-3

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In Their Own Words, Americans Describe the Struggles and Silver Linings of the COVID-19 Pandemic

The outbreak has dramatically changed americans’ lives and relationships over the past year. we asked people to tell us about their experiences – good and bad – in living through this moment in history..

Pew Research Center has been asking survey questions over the past year about Americans’ views and reactions to the COVID-19 pandemic. In August, we gave the public a chance to tell us in their own words how the pandemic has affected them in their personal lives. We wanted to let them tell us how their lives have become more difficult or challenging, and we also asked about any unexpectedly positive events that might have happened during that time.

The vast majority of Americans (89%) mentioned at least one negative change in their own lives, while a smaller share (though still a 73% majority) mentioned at least one unexpected upside. Most have experienced these negative impacts and silver linings simultaneously: Two-thirds (67%) of Americans mentioned at least one negative and at least one positive change since the pandemic began.

For this analysis, we surveyed 9,220 U.S. adults between Aug. 31-Sept. 7, 2020. Everyone who completed the survey is a member of Pew Research Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories.  Read more about the ATP’s methodology . 

Respondents to the survey were asked to describe in their own words how their lives have been difficult or challenging since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, and to describe any positive aspects of the situation they have personally experienced as well. Overall, 84% of respondents provided an answer to one or both of the questions. The Center then categorized a random sample of 4,071 of their answers using a combination of in-house human coders, Amazon’s Mechanical Turk service and keyword-based pattern matching. The full methodology  and questions used in this analysis can be found here.

In many ways, the negatives clearly outweigh the positives – an unsurprising reaction to a pandemic that had killed  more than 180,000 Americans  at the time the survey was conducted. Across every major aspect of life mentioned in these responses, a larger share mentioned a negative impact than mentioned an unexpected upside. Americans also described the negative aspects of the pandemic in greater detail: On average, negative responses were longer than positive ones (27 vs. 19 words). But for all the difficulties and challenges of the pandemic, a majority of Americans were able to think of at least one silver lining. 

Both the negative and positive impacts described in these responses cover many aspects of life, none of which were mentioned by a majority of Americans. Instead, the responses reveal a pandemic that has affected Americans’ lives in a variety of ways, of which there is no “typical” experience. Indeed, not all groups seem to have experienced the pandemic equally. For instance, younger and more educated Americans were more likely to mention silver linings, while women were more likely than men to mention challenges or difficulties.

Here are some direct quotes that reveal how Americans are processing the new reality that has upended life across the country.

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Covid 19 Essay in English

Essay on Covid -19: In a very short amount of time, coronavirus has spread globally. It has had an enormous impact on people's lives, economy, and societies all around the world, affecting every country. Governments have had to take severe measures to try and contain the pandemic. The virus has altered our way of life in many ways, including its effects on our health and our economy. Here are a few sample essays on ‘CoronaVirus’.

100 Words Essay on Covid 19

200 words essay on covid 19, 500 words essay on covid 19.

COVID-19 or Corona Virus is a novel coronavirus that was first identified in 2019. It is similar to other coronaviruses, such as SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV, but it is more contagious and has caused more severe respiratory illness in people who have been infected. The novel coronavirus became a global pandemic in a very short period of time. It has affected lives, economies and societies across the world, leaving no country untouched. The virus has caused governments to take drastic measures to try and contain it. From health implications to economic and social ramifications, COVID-19 impacted every part of our lives. It has been more than 2 years since the pandemic hit and the world is still recovering from its effects.

Since the outbreak of COVID-19, the world has been impacted in a number of ways. For one, the global economy has taken a hit as businesses have been forced to close their doors. This has led to widespread job losses and an increase in poverty levels around the world. Additionally, countries have had to impose strict travel restrictions in an attempt to contain the virus, which has resulted in a decrease in tourism and international trade. Furthermore, the pandemic has put immense pressure on healthcare systems globally, as hospitals have been overwhelmed with patients suffering from the virus. Lastly, the outbreak has led to a general feeling of anxiety and uncertainty, as people are fearful of contracting the disease.

My Experience of COVID-19

I still remember how abruptly colleges and schools shut down in March 2020. I was a college student at that time and I was under the impression that everything would go back to normal in a few weeks. I could not have been more wrong. The situation only got worse every week and the government had to impose a lockdown. There were so many restrictions in place. For example, we had to wear face masks whenever we left the house, and we could only go out for essential errands. Restaurants and shops were only allowed to operate at take-out capacity, and many businesses were shut down.

In the current scenario, coronavirus is dominating all aspects of our lives. The coronavirus pandemic has wreaked havoc upon people’s lives, altering the way we live and work in a very short amount of time. It has revolutionised how we think about health care, education, and even social interaction. This virus has had long-term implications on our society, including its impact on mental health, economic stability, and global politics. But we as individuals can help to mitigate these effects by taking personal responsibility to protect themselves and those around them from infection.

Effects of CoronaVirus on Education

The outbreak of coronavirus has had a significant impact on education systems around the world. In China, where the virus originated, all schools and universities were closed for several weeks in an effort to contain the spread of the disease. Many other countries have followed suit, either closing schools altogether or suspending classes for a period of time.

This has resulted in a major disruption to the education of millions of students. Some have been able to continue their studies online, but many have not had access to the internet or have not been able to afford the costs associated with it. This has led to a widening of the digital divide between those who can afford to continue their education online and those who cannot.

The closure of schools has also had a negative impact on the mental health of many students. With no face-to-face contact with friends and teachers, some students have felt isolated and anxious. This has been compounded by the worry and uncertainty surrounding the virus itself.

The situation with coronavirus has improved and schools have been reopened but students are still catching up with the gap of 2 years that the pandemic created. In the meantime, governments and educational institutions are working together to find ways to support students and ensure that they are able to continue their education despite these difficult circumstances.

Effects of CoronaVirus on Economy

The outbreak of the coronavirus has had a significant impact on the global economy. The virus, which originated in China, has spread to over two hundred countries, resulting in widespread panic and a decrease in global trade. As a result of the outbreak, many businesses have been forced to close their doors, leading to a rise in unemployment. In addition, the stock market has taken a severe hit.

Effects of CoronaVirus on Health

The effects that coronavirus has on one's health are still being studied and researched as the virus continues to spread throughout the world. However, some of the potential effects on health that have been observed thus far include respiratory problems, fever, and coughing. In severe cases, pneumonia, kidney failure, and death can occur. It is important for people who think they may have been exposed to the virus to seek medical attention immediately so that they can be treated properly and avoid any serious complications. There is no specific cure or treatment for coronavirus at this time, but there are ways to help ease symptoms and prevent the virus from spreading.

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The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic

The year 2019 will forever be engraved in many people’s hearts and minds as the time when a deadly virus known as the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) invaded almost all the sectors, thereby disrupting daily activities. It is described as a communicable respiratory illness which is triggered by a new strain of coronavirus which leads to various ailments in human beings. There is currently no known cure or vaccine for the virus as scientists worldwide are still trying to learn about the illness to respond appropriately through research (Goodell, 2020). This paper aims at exploring the effects that the pandemic has had on society regarding the economy, social life, education, religion, and family.

The emergence of the pandemic, which began in China-2019, quickly spread to other nations across the world with devastating effects on their economies As a way of containing the disease, many countries instituted strict measures, such as curfews, the mandatory wearing of masks, and social distancing of 1 meter apart (Goodell, 2020). Covid-19 has significantly changed the way these preventive methods relate with each concerning trade matters. The majority of the states affected opted to close their borders as fear among the citizens increased. The implementation of the strict rules interfered with the business operations of many nations. It became difficult for international trade to continue as a result of the closed borders. Most businesses have also had to close due to financial constraints.

When it comes to socialization, people have been forced to use other means to meet their friends and families across the world. Social media platforms have seen an increased usage during this difficult time as people try to find new ways of socializing. It has happened especially in such countries as Australia, where the restrictions were extreme as it enforced a lockdown for close to a hundred days (Goodell, 2020). The use of masks is also quickly becoming the new norm across numerous states. Unlike in developed countries where the governments have offered their citizens some aid mostly in terms of cash transfers, developing countries have struggled to balance between the people’s livelihood and the containment of the Covid-19. As such, most people have turned to social media platforms as a medium of communication and socialization due to lockdowns.

Learning institutions have also not been spared by the Covid-19 pandemic. Most countries affected by the spread of the virus were forced to suspend their educational curriculum calendar to allow children and university students to stay home until the time when the disease is finally neutralized (Goodell, 2020). However, students and parents have been pushing the governments to resume schools with clear protocols which ensure that both the students and the teachers follow the rules, including the mandatory wearing of masks. Religion has also been significantly affected as it has become difficult for people to seek for spiritual nourishment (Goodell, 2020). Many religious leaders have had to devise other ways of reaching out to the congregates. For example, many churches now have to move their services online by using such platforms as YouTube, Facebook, Zoom, among others to convey essential teachings.

Covid-19 has also directly affected many families across the world, as the majority have succumbed to the disease. The United States of America and Italy are some of the pandemic’s worst casualties, where many people were killed by the lethal virus (Goodell, 2020). Some people have in the end lost more than one member of the family because of the disease, and in some worse case scenarios, the illness has claimed a whole family.

In conclusion, this paper has highlighted the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on the economy, social life, education, religion, and family units. Many countries and businesses had underestimated the disease’s impact before they later suffered from the consequences. Therefore, international bodies, such as the World Health Organization, need to help developing countries establish critical management healthcare systems, which can help to deal with the future pandemics.

Goodell, J. W. (2020). COVID-19 and finance: Agendas for future research. Finance Research Letters , 35 , 101512. Web.

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Special Issue: COVID-19

This essay was published as part of a Special Issue on Misinformation and COVID-19, guest-edited by Dr. Meghan McGinty (Director of Emergency Management, NYC Health + Hospitals) and Nat Gyenes (Director, Meedan Digital Health Lab).

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The causes and consequences of COVID-19 misperceptions: Understanding the role of news and social media

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We investigate the relationship between media consumption, misinformation, and important attitudes and behaviours during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We find that comparatively more misinformation circulates on Twitter, while news media tends to reinforce public health recommendations like social distancing. We find that exposure to social media is associated with misperceptions regarding basic facts about COVID-19 while the inverse is true for news media. These misperceptions are in turn associated with lower compliance with social distancing measures. We thus draw a clear link from misinformation circulating on social media, notably Twitter, to behaviours and attitudes that potentially magnify the scale and lethality of COVID-19.

Department of Political Science, McGill University, Canada

Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto, Canada

Max Bell School of Public Policy, McGill University, Canada

School of Computer Science, McGill University, Canada

Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, McGill University, Canada

Computer Science Program, McGill University, Canada

Research Questions

• How prevalent is misinformation surrounding COVID-19 on Twitter, and how does this compare to Canadian news media?
• Does the type of media one is exposed to influence social distancing behaviours and beliefs about COVID-19?
• Is there a link between COVID-19 misinformation and perceptions of the pandemic’s severity and compliance with social distancing recommendations?

Essay Summary

• We evaluate the presence of misinformation and public health recommendations regarding COVID-19 in a massive corpus of tweets as well as all articles published on nineteen Canadian news sites. Using these data, we show that preventative measures are more encouraged and covered on traditional news media, while misinformation appears more frequently on Twitter.
• To evaluate the impact of this greater level of misinformation, we conducted a nationally representative survey that included questions about common misperceptions regarding COVID-19, risk perceptions, social distancing compliance, and exposure to traditional news and social media. We find that being exposed to news media is associated with fewer misperceptions and more social distancing compliance while conversely, social media exposure is associated with more misperceptions and less social distancing compliance.
• Misperceptions regarding the virus are in turn associated with less compliance with social distancing measures, even when controlling for a broad range of other attitudes and characteristics.
• Association between social media exposure and social distancing non-compliance is eliminated when accounting for effect of misperceptions, providing evidence that social media is associated with non-compliance through increasing misperceptions about the virus.

Implications

The COVID-19 pandemic has been accompanied by a so-called “infodemic”—a global spread of misinformation that poses a serious problem for public health. Infodemics are concerning because the spread of false or misleading information has the capacity to change transmission patterns (Kim et al., 2019) and consequently the scale and lethality of a pandemic. This information can be shared by any media, but there is reason to be particularly concerned about the role that social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, play in incidentally boosting misperceptions. These platforms are increasingly relied upon as primary sources of news (Mitchell et al., 2016) and misinformation has been heavily documented on them (Garrett, 2019; Vicario et al., 2016). Scholars have found medical and health misinformation on the platforms, including that related to vaccines (Radzikowski et al., 2016) and other virus epidemics such as Ebola (Fung et al., 2016) and Zika (Sharma et al., 2017). 

However, misinformation content typically makes up a low percentage of overall discussion of a topic (e.g. Fung et al., 2016) and mere exposure to misinformation does not guarantee belief in that misinformation. More research is thus needed to understand the extent and consequences of misinformation surrounding COVID-19 on social media. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Twitter, Facebook and other platforms have engaged in efforts to combat misinformation but they have continued to receive widespread criticism that misinformation is still appearing on prominent pages and groups (Kouzy et al., 2020; NewsGuard, 2020). The extent to which misinformation continues to circulate on these platforms and influence people’s attitudes and behaviours is still very much an open question.

Here, we draw on three data sets and a sequential mixed method approach to better understand the consequences of online misinformation for important behaviours and attitudes. First, we collected nearly 2.5 million tweets explicitly referring to COVID-19 in the Canadian context. Second, we collected just over 9 thousand articles from nineteen Canadian English-language news sites from the same time period. We coded both of these media sets for misinformation and public health recommendations. Third, we conducted a nationally representative survey that included questions related to media consumption habits, COVID-19 perceptions and misperceptions, and social distancing compliance. As our outcome variables are continuous, we use Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression to identify relationships between news and social media exposure, misperceptions, compliance with social distancing measures, and risk perceptions. We use these data to illustrate: 1) the relative prevalence of misinformation on Twitter; and 2) a powerful association between social media usage and misperceptions, on the one hand, and social distancing non-compliance on the other.

Misinformation and compliance with social distancing

We first compare the presence of misinformation on Twitter with that on news media and find, consistent with the other country cases (Chadwick & Vaccari, 2019; Vicario et al., 2016), comparatively higher levels of misinformation circulating on the social media platform. We also found that recommendations for safe practices during the pandemic (e.g. washing hands, social distancing) appeared much more frequently in the Canadian news media. These findings are in line with literature examining fake news which finds a large difference in information quality across media (Al-Rawi, 2019; Guess & Nyhan, 2018).

Spending time in a media environment that contains misinformation is likely to change attitudes and behaviours. Even if users are not nested in networks that propagate misinformation, they are likely to be incidentally exposed to information from a variety of perspectives (Feezell, 2018; Fletcher & Nielsen, 2018; Weeks et al., 2017). Even a highly curated social media feed is thus still likely to contain misinformation. As cumulative exposure to misinformation increases, users are likely to experience a reinforcement effect whereby familiarity leads to stronger belief (Dechêne et al., 2010).

To evaluate this empirically, we conducted a national survey that included questions on information consumption habits and a battery of COVID-19 misperceptions that could be the result of exposure to misinformation. We find that those who self-report exposure to the misinformation-rich social media environment do tend to have more misperceptions regarding COVID-19. These findings are consistent with others that link exposure to misinformation and misperceptions (Garrett et al., 2016; Jamieson & Albarracín, 2020). Social media users also self-report less compliance with social distancing.

Misperceptions are most meaningful when they impact behaviors in dangerous ways. During a pandemic, misperceptions can be fatal. In this case, we find that misperceptions are associated with reduced COVID-19 risk perceptions and with lower compliance with social distancing measures. We continue to find strong effects after controlling for socio-economic characteristics as well as scientific literacy. After accounting for the effect of misperceptions on social distancing non-compliance, social media usage no longer has a significant association with non-compliance, providing evidence that social media may lead to less social distancing compliance through its effect on COVID-19 misperceptions.

While some social media companies have made efforts to suppress misinformation on their platforms, there continues to be a high level of misinformation relative to news media. Highly polarized political environments and media ecosystems can lead to the spread of misinformation, such as in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic (Allcott et al., 2020; Motta et al., 2020). But even in healthy media ecosystems with less partisan news (Owen et al., 2020), social media can continue to facilitate the spread of misinformation. There is a real danger that without concerted efforts to reduce the amount of misinformation shared on social media, the large-scale social efforts required to combat COVID-19 will be undermined. 

We contribute to a growing base of evidence that misinformation circulating on social media poses public health risks and join others in calling for social media companies to put greater focus on flattening the curve of misinformation (Donovan, 2020). These findings also provide governments with stronger evidence that the misinformation circulating on social media can be directly linked to misperceptions and public health risks. Such evidence is essential for them to chart an effective policy course. Finally, the methods and approach developed in this paper can be fruitfully applied to study other waves of misinformation and the research community can build upon the link clearly drawn between misinformation exposure, misperceptions, and downstream attitudes and behaviours.

We found use of social media platforms broadly contributes to misperceptions but were unable to precise the overall level of misinformation circulating on non-Twitter social media. Data access for researchers to platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram is limited and virtually non-existent for SnapChat, WhatsApp, and WeChat. Cross-platform content comparisons are an important ingredient for a rich understand of the social media environment and these social media companies must better open their platforms to research in the public interest. 

Finding 1: Misinformation about COVID-19 is circulated more on Twitter as compared to traditional media.

We find large differences between the quality of information shared about COVID-19 on traditional news and Twitter. Figure 1 shows the percentage of COVID-19 related content that contains information linked to a particular theme. The plot reports the prevalence of information on both social and news media for: 1) three specific pieces of misinformation; 2) a general set of content that describes the pandemic itself as a conspiracy or a hoax; and 3) advice about hygiene and social distancing during the pandemic. We differentiate content that shared misinformation (red in the plot) from content that debunked misinformation (green in the plot). 

There are large differences between the levels of misinformation on Twitter and news media. Misinformation was comparatively more common on Twitter across all four categories, while debunking was relatively more common in traditional news. Meanwhile, advice on hygiene and social distancing appeared much more frequently in news media. Note that higher percentages are to be expected for longer format news articles since we rely on keyword searches for identification. This makes the misinformation findings even starker – despite much higher average word counts, far fewer news articles propagate misinformation.

Finding 2: There is a strong association between social media exposure and misperceptions about COVID-19. The inverse is true for exposure to traditional news.

Among our survey respondents we find a corresponding strong association between social media exposure and misperceptions about COVID-19. These results are plotted in Figure 2, with controls included for both socioeconomic characteristics and demographics. Moving from no social media exposure to its maximum is expected to increase one’s misperceptions of COVID-19 by 0.22 on the 0-1 scale and decreased self-reported social distancing compliance by 0.12 on that same scale.

This result stands in stark contrast with the observed relationship between traditional news exposure and our outcome measures. Traditional news exposure is  positively  associated with correct perceptions regarding COVID-19. Moving from no news exposure to its highest level is expected to reduce misperceptions by 0.12 on the 0-1 scale and to increase social distancing compliance by 0.28 on that same scale. The effects are plotted in Figure 2. Social media usage appears to be correlated with COVID-19 misperceptions, suggesting these misperceptions are partially a result of misinformation on social media. The same cannot be said of traditional news exposure.

Finding 3: Misperceptions about the pandemic are associated with lower levels of risk perceptions and social distancing compliance.

COVID-19 misperceptions are also powerfully associated with  lower  levels of social distancing compliance. Moving from the lowest level of COVID-19 misperceptions to its maximum is associated with a reduction of one’s social distancing by 0.39 on the 0-1 scale. The previously observed relationship between social media exposure and misperceptions disappears, suggestive of a mediated relationship. That is, social media exposure increases misperceptions, which in turn reduces social distancing compliance. Misperceptions is also weakly associated with lower COVID-19 risk perceptions. Estimates from our models using COVID-19 concern as the outcome can be found in the left panel of Figure 3, while social distancing can be found in the right panel.

Finally, we also see that the relationship between misinformation and both social distancing compliance and COVID-19 concern hold when including controls for science literacy and a number of fundamental predispositions that are likely associated with both misperceptions and following the advice of scientific experts, such as anti-intellectualism, pseudoscientific beliefs, and left-right ideology. These estimates can similarly be found in Figure 3.

Canadian Twitter and news data were collected from March 26 th  to April 6 th , 2020. We collected all English-language tweets from a set of 620,000 users that have been determined to be likely Canadians. For inclusion, a given user must self-identify as Canadian-based, follow a large number of Canadian political elite accounts, or frequently use Canadian-specific hashtags. News media was collected from nineteen prominent Canadian news sites with active RSS feeds. These tweets and news articles were searched for “covid” or “coronavirus”, leaving a sample of 2.25 million tweets and 8,857 news articles.

Of the COVID-19 related content, we searched for terms associated with four instances of misinformation that circulated during the COVID-19 pandemic: that COVID-19 was no more serious than the flu, that vitamin C or other supplements will prevent contraction of the virus, that the initial animal-to-human transfer of the virus was the direct result of eating bats, or that COVID-19 was a hoax or conspiracy. Given that we used keyword searches to identify content, we manually reviewed a random sample of 500 tweets from each instance of misinformation. Each tweet was coded as one of four categories: propagating misinformation, combatting misinformation, content with the relevant keywords but unrelated to misinformation, or content that refers to the misinformation but does not offer comment. 

We then calculated the overall level of misinformation for that instance on Twitter by multiplying the overall volume of tweets by the proportion of hand-coded content where misinformation was identified. Each news article that included relevant keywords was similarly coded. The volume of the news mentioning these terms was sufficiently low that all news articles were hand coded. To identify health recommendations, we used a similar keyword search for terms associated with particular recommendations: 1) social distancing including staying at home, staying at least 6 feet or 2 meters away and avoiding gatherings; and 2) washing hands and not touching any part of your face. 1 Further details on the media collection strategy and hand-coding schema are available in the supporting materials.

For survey data, we used a sample of nearly 2,500 Canadian citizens 18 years or older drawn from a probability-based online national panel fielded from April 2-6, 2020. Quotas we set on age, gender, region, and language to ensure sample representativeness, and data was further weighted within region by gender and age based on the 2016 Canadian census.

We measure levels of COVID-19 misperceptions by asking respondents to rate the truthfulness of a series of nine false claims, such as the coronavirus being no worse than the seasonal flu or that it can be warded off with Vitamin C. Each was asked on a scale from definitely false (0) to definitely true (5). We use Cronbach’s Alpha as an indicator of scale reliability. Cronbach’s Alpha ranges from 0-1, with scores above 0.8 indicating the reliability is “good.” These items score 0.88, so we can safely construct a 0-1 scale of misperceptions from them. 

We evaluate COVID-19 risk perceptions with a pair of questions asking respondents how serious of a threat they believe the pandemic to be for themselves and for Canadians, respectively. Each question was asked on a scale from not at all (0) to very (4). We construct a continuous index with these items.

We quantify social distancing by asking respondents to indicate which of a series of behaviours they had undertaken in response to the pandemic, such as working from home or avoiding in-person contact with friends, family, and acquaintances. We use principal component analysis (PCA) to reduce the number of dimensions in these data while minimizing information loss. The analysis revealed 2 distinct dimensions in our questions. One dimension includes factors strongly determined by occupation, such as working from home and switching to online meetings. The other dimension contains more inclusive behaviours such as avoiding contact, travel, and crowded places. We generate predictions from the PCA for this latter dimension to use in our analyses. The factor loadings can be found in Table A1 of the supporting materials.

 We gauge news and social media consumption by asking respondents to identify news outlets and social media platforms they have used over the past week for political news. The list of news outlets included 17 organizations such as mainstream sources like CBC and Global, and partisan outlets like Rebel Media and National Observer. The list of social media platforms included 10 options such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. We sum the total number of outlets/platforms respondents report using and take the log to adjust for extreme values. We measure offline political discussion with an index based on questions asking how often respondents have discussed politics with family, friends, and acquaintances over the past week. Descriptions of our primary variables can be found in Table A2 of the supporting materials. 

We evaluate our hypotheses using a standard design that evaluates the association between our explanatory and outcome variables controlling for other observable factors we measured. In practice, randomly assigning social media exposure is impractical, while randomly assigning misinformation is unethical. This approach allows us to describe these relationships, though we cannot make definite claims to causality.

We hypothesize that social media exposure is associated with misinformation on COVID-19. Figure 2 presents the coefficients of models predicting the effects of news exposure, social media exposure, and political discussion on COVID-19 misinformation, risk perceptions, and social distancing. Socio-economic and demographic control estimates are not displayed. Full estimation results can be found in the Table A3 of the supporting materials. 

We further hypothesize that COVID-19 misinformation is associated with lower COVID-19 risk perceptions and less social distancing compliance. Figure 3 presents the coefficients for models predicting the effects of misinformation, news exposure, and social media exposure on severity perceptions and social distancing. We show models with and without controls for science literacy and other predispositions. Full estimation results can be found in the Table A4 of the supporting materials.

Limitations and robustness

A study such as this comes with clear limitations. First, we have evaluated information coming from only a section of the overall media ecosystem and during a specific time-period. The level of misinformation differs across platforms and online news sites and a more granular investigation into these dynamics would be valuable. Our analysis suggests that similar dynamics exist across social media platforms, however. In the supplementary materials we show that associations between misperceptions and social media usage are even higher for other social media platforms, suggesting that our analysis of Twitter content may underrepresent the prevalence of misinformation on social media writ large. As noted above, existing limitations on data access make such cross-platform research difficult.

Second, our data is drawn from a single country and language case study and other countries may have different media environments and levels of misinformation circulating on social media. We anticipate the underlying dynamics found in this paper to hold across these contexts, however. Those who consume information from platforms where misinformation is more prevalent will have greater misperceptions and that these misperceptions will be linked to lower compliance with social distancing and lower risk perceptions. Third, an ecological problem is present wherein we do not link survey respondents directly to their social media consumption (and evaluation of the misinformation they are exposed to) and lack the ability to randomly assign social media exposure to make a strong causal argument. We cannot and do not make a causal argument here but argue instead that there is strong evidence for a misinformation to misperceptions to lower social distancing compliance link. 

• / Fake News
• / Mainstream Media
• / Public Health
• / Social Media

Cite this Essay

Bridgman, A., Merkley, E., Loewen, P. J., Owen, T., Ruths, D., Teichmann, L., & Zhilin, O. (2020). The causes and consequences of COVID-19 misperceptions: Understanding the role of news and social media. Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Misinformation Review . https://doi.org/10.37016/mr-2020-028

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The project was funded through the Department of Canadian Heritage’s Digital Citizens Initiative.

Competing Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

The research protocol was approved by the institutional review board at University of Toronto. Human subjects gave informed consent before participating and were debriefed at the end of the study.

This  is  an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative  Commons  Attribution  License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original author and source are properly credited.

Data Availability

All materials needed to replicate this study are available via the Harvard Dataverse: https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/5QS2XP .

The pandemic has had devastating impacts on learning. What will it take to help students catch up?

Subscribe to the brown center on education policy newsletter, megan kuhfeld , megan kuhfeld senior research scientist - nwea @megankuhfeld jim soland , jim soland assistant professor, school of education and human development - university of virginia, affiliated research fellow - nwea @jsoland karyn lewis , and karyn lewis director, center for school and student progress - nwea @karynlew emily morton emily morton research scientist - nwea @emily_r_morton.

March 3, 2022

As we reach the two-year mark of the initial wave of pandemic-induced school shutdowns, academic normalcy remains out of reach for many students, educators, and parents. In addition to surging COVID-19 cases at the end of 2021, schools have faced severe staff shortages , high rates of absenteeism and quarantines , and rolling school closures . Furthermore, students and educators continue to struggle with mental health challenges , higher rates of violence and misbehavior , and concerns about lost instructional time .

As we outline in our new research study released in January, the cumulative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on students’ academic achievement has been large. We tracked changes in math and reading test scores across the first two years of the pandemic using data from 5.4 million U.S. students in grades 3-8. We focused on test scores from immediately before the pandemic (fall 2019), following the initial onset (fall 2020), and more than one year into pandemic disruptions (fall 2021).

Average fall 2021 math test scores in grades 3-8 were 0.20-0.27 standard deviations (SDs) lower relative to same-grade peers in fall 2019, while reading test scores were 0.09-0.18 SDs lower. This is a sizable drop. For context, the math drops are significantly larger than estimated impacts from other large-scale school disruptions, such as after Hurricane Katrina—math scores dropped 0.17 SDs in one year for New Orleans evacuees .

Even more concerning, test-score gaps between students in low-poverty and high-poverty elementary schools grew by approximately 20% in math (corresponding to 0.20 SDs) and 15% in reading (0.13 SDs), primarily during the 2020-21 school year. Further, achievement tended to drop more between fall 2020 and 2021 than between fall 2019 and 2020 (both overall and differentially by school poverty), indicating that disruptions to learning have continued to negatively impact students well past the initial hits following the spring 2020 school closures.

These numbers are alarming and potentially demoralizing, especially given the heroic efforts of students to learn and educators to teach in incredibly trying times. From our perspective, these test-score drops in no way indicate that these students represent a “ lost generation ” or that we should give up hope. Most of us have never lived through a pandemic, and there is so much we don’t know about students’ capacity for resiliency in these circumstances and what a timeline for recovery will look like. Nor are we suggesting that teachers are somehow at fault given the achievement drops that occurred between 2020 and 2021; rather, educators had difficult jobs before the pandemic, and now are contending with huge new challenges, many outside their control.

Clearly, however, there’s work to do. School districts and states are currently making important decisions about which interventions and strategies to implement to mitigate the learning declines during the last two years. Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) investments from the American Rescue Plan provided nearly $200 billion to public schools to spend on COVID-19-related needs. Of that sum, $22 billion is dedicated specifically to addressing learning loss using “evidence-based interventions” focused on the “ disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on underrepresented student subgroups. ” Reviews of district and state spending plans (see Future Ed , EduRecoveryHub , and RAND’s American School District Panel for more details) indicate that districts are spending their ESSER dollars designated for academic recovery on a wide variety of strategies, with summer learning, tutoring, after-school programs, and extended school-day and school-year initiatives rising to the top.

Comparing the negative impacts from learning disruptions to the positive impacts from interventions

To help contextualize the magnitude of the impacts of COVID-19, we situate test-score drops during the pandemic relative to the test-score gains associated with common interventions being employed by districts as part of pandemic recovery efforts. If we assume that such interventions will continue to be as successful in a COVID-19 school environment, can we expect that these strategies will be effective enough to help students catch up? To answer this question, we draw from recent reviews of research on high-dosage tutoring , summer learning programs , reductions in class size , and extending the school day (specifically for literacy instruction) . We report effect sizes for each intervention specific to a grade span and subject wherever possible (e.g., tutoring has been found to have larger effects in elementary math than in reading).

Figure 1 shows the standardized drops in math test scores between students testing in fall 2019 and fall 2021 (separately by elementary and middle school grades) relative to the average effect size of various educational interventions. The average effect size for math tutoring matches or exceeds the average COVID-19 score drop in math. Research on tutoring indicates that it often works best in younger grades, and when provided by a teacher rather than, say, a parent. Further, some of the tutoring programs that produce the biggest effects can be quite intensive (and likely expensive), including having full-time tutors supporting all students (not just those needing remediation) in one-on-one settings during the school day. Meanwhile, the average effect of reducing class size is negative but not significant, with high variability in the impact across different studies. Summer programs in math have been found to be effective (average effect size of .10 SDs), though these programs in isolation likely would not eliminate the COVID-19 test-score drops.

Figure 1: Math COVID-19 test-score drops compared to the effect sizes of various educational interventions

Source: COVID-19 score drops are pulled from Kuhfeld et al. (2022) Table 5; reduction-in-class-size results are from pg. 10 of Figles et al. (2018) Table 2; summer program results are pulled from Lynch et al (2021) Table 2; and tutoring estimates are pulled from Nictow et al (2020) Table 3B. Ninety-five percent confidence intervals are shown with vertical lines on each bar.

Notes: Kuhfeld et al. and Nictow et al. reported effect sizes separately by grade span; Figles et al. and Lynch et al. report an overall effect size across elementary and middle grades. We were unable to find a rigorous study that reported effect sizes for extending the school day/year on math performance. Nictow et al. and Kraft & Falken (2021) also note large variations in tutoring effects depending on the type of tutor, with larger effects for teacher and paraprofessional tutoring programs than for nonprofessional and parent tutoring. Class-size reductions included in the Figles meta-analysis ranged from a minimum of one to minimum of eight students per class.

Figure 2 displays a similar comparison using effect sizes from reading interventions. The average effect of tutoring programs on reading achievement is larger than the effects found for the other interventions, though summer reading programs and class size reduction both produced average effect sizes in the ballpark of the COVID-19 reading score drops.

Figure 2: Reading COVID-19 test-score drops compared to the effect sizes of various educational interventions

Source: COVID-19 score drops are pulled from Kuhfeld et al. (2022) Table 5; extended-school-day results are from Figlio et al. (2018) Table 2; reduction-in-class-size results are from pg. 10 of Figles et al. (2018) ; summer program results are pulled from Kim & Quinn (2013) Table 3; and tutoring estimates are pulled from Nictow et al (2020) Table 3B. Ninety-five percent confidence intervals are shown with vertical lines on each bar.

Notes: While Kuhfeld et al. and Nictow et al. reported effect sizes separately by grade span, Figlio et al. and Kim & Quinn report an overall effect size across elementary and middle grades. Class-size reductions included in the Figles meta-analysis ranged from a minimum of one to minimum of eight students per class.

There are some limitations of drawing on research conducted prior to the pandemic to understand our ability to address the COVID-19 test-score drops. First, these studies were conducted under conditions that are very different from what schools currently face, and it is an open question whether the effectiveness of these interventions during the pandemic will be as consistent as they were before the pandemic. Second, we have little evidence and guidance about the efficacy of these interventions at the unprecedented scale that they are now being considered. For example, many school districts are expanding summer learning programs, but school districts have struggled to find staff interested in teaching summer school to meet the increased demand. Finally, given the widening test-score gaps between low- and high-poverty schools, it’s uncertain whether these interventions can actually combat the range of new challenges educators are facing in order to narrow these gaps. That is, students could catch up overall, yet the pandemic might still have lasting, negative effects on educational equality in this country.

Given that the current initiatives are unlikely to be implemented consistently across (and sometimes within) districts, timely feedback on the effects of initiatives and any needed adjustments will be crucial to districts’ success. The Road to COVID Recovery project and the National Student Support Accelerator are two such large-scale evaluation studies that aim to produce this type of evidence while providing resources for districts to track and evaluate their own programming. Additionally, a growing number of resources have been produced with recommendations on how to best implement recovery programs, including scaling up tutoring , summer learning programs , and expanded learning time .

Ultimately, there is much work to be done, and the challenges for students, educators, and parents are considerable. But this may be a moment when decades of educational reform, intervention, and research pay off. Relying on what we have learned could show the way forward.

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Editor in Chief's Introduction to Essays on the Impact of COVID-19 on Work and Workers

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared that COVID-19 was a global pandemic, indicating significant global spread of an infectious disease ( World Health Organization, 2020 ). At that point, there were 118,000 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in 110 countries. China had been the first country with a widespread outbreak in January, and South Korea, Iran and Italy following in February with their own outbreaks. Soon, the virus was in all continents and over 177 countries, and as of this writing, the United States has the highest number of confirmed cases and, sadly, the most deaths. The virus was extremely contagious and led to death in the most vulnerable, particularly those older than 60 and those with underlying conditions. The most critical cases led to an overwhelming number being admitted into the intensive care units of hospitals, leading to a concern that the virus would overwhelm local health care systems. Today, in early May 2020, there have been nearly 250,000 deaths worldwide, with over 3,500,000 confirmed cases ( Hopkins, 2020 ). The human toll is staggering, and experts are predicting a second wave in summer or fall.

As the deaths rose from the virus that had no known treatment or vaccine countries shut their borders, banned travel to other countries and began to issue orders for their citizens to stay at home, with no gatherings of more than 10 individuals. Schools and universities closed their physical locations and moved education online. Sporting events were canceled, airlines cut flights, tourism evaporated, restaurants, movie theaters and bars closed, theater productions canceled, manufacturing facilities, services, and retail stores closed. In some businesses and industries, employees have been able to work remotely from home, but in others, workers have been laid off, furloughed, or had their hours cut. The International Labor Organization (ILO) estimates that there was a 4.5% reduction in hours in the first quarter of 2020, and 10.5% reduction is expected in the second quarter ( ILO, 2020a ). The latter is equivalent to 305 million jobs ( ILO, 2020a ).

Globally, over 430 million enterprises are at risk of disruption, with about half of those in the wholesale and retail trades ( ILO, 2020a ). Much focus in the press has been on the impact in Europe and North America, but the effect on developing countries is even more critical. An example of the latter is the Bangladeshi ready-made-garment sector ( Leitheiser et al., 2020 ), a global industry that depends on a supply chain of raw material from a few countries and produces those garments for retail stores throughout North America and Europe. But, in January 2020, raw material from China was delayed by the shutdown in China, creating delays and work stoppages in Bangladesh. By the time Bangladeshi factories had the material to make garments, in March, retailers in Europe and North American began to cancel orders or put them on hold, canceling or delaying payment. Factories shut down and workers were laid off without pay. Nearly a million people lost their jobs. Overall, since February 2020, the factories in Bangladesh have lost nearly 3 billion dollars in revenue. And, the retail stores that would have sold the garments have also closed. This demonstrates the ripple effect of the disruption of one industry that affects multiple countries and sets of workers, because consider that, in turn, there will be less raw material needed from China, and fewer workers needed there. One need only multiply this example by hundreds to consider the global impact of COVID-19 across the world of work.

The ILO (2020b) notes that it is difficult to collect employment statistics from different countries, so a total global unemployment rate is unavailable at this time. However, they predict significant increase in unemployment, and the number of individuals filing for unemployment benefits in the United States may be an indicator of the magnitude of those unemployed. In the United States, over 30 million filed for unemployment between March 11 and April 30 ( Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2020 ), effectively this is an unemployment rate of 18%. By contrast, in February 2020, the US unemployment rate was 3.5% ( Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2020 ).

Clearly, COVID-19 has had an enormous disruption on work and workers, most critically for those who have lost their employment. But, even for those continuing to work, there have been disruptions in where people work, with whom they work, what they do, and how much they earn. And, as of this writing, it is also a time of great uncertainty, as countries are slowly trying to ease restrictions to allow people to go back to work--- in a “new normal”, without the ability to predict if they can prevent further infectious “spikes”. The anxieties about not knowing what is coming, when it will end, or what work will entail led us to develop this set of essays about future research on COVID-19 and its impact on work and workers.

These essays began with an idea by Associate Editor Jos Akkermans, who noted to me that the global pandemic was creating a set of career shocks for workers. He suggested writing an essay for the Journal . The Journal of Vocational Behavior has not traditionally published essays, but these are such unusual times, and COVID-19 is so relevant to our collective research on work that I thought it was a good idea. I issued an invitation to the Associate Editors to submit a brief (3000 word) essay on the implications of COVID-19 on work and/or workers with an emphasis on research in the area. At the same time, a group of international scholars was coming together to consider the effects of COVID-19 on unemployment in several countries, and I invited that group to contribute an essay, as well ( Blustein et al., 2020 ).

The following are a set of nine thoughtful set of papers on how the COVID-19 could (and perhaps will) affect vocational behavior; they all provide suggestions for future research. Akkermans, Richardson, and Kraimer (2020) explore how the pandemic may be a career shock for many, but also how that may not necessarily be a negative experience. Blustein et al. (2020) focus on global unemployment, also acknowledging the privileged status they have as professors studying these phenomena. Cho examines the effect of the pandemic on micro-boundaries (across domains) as well as across national (macro) boundaries ( Cho, 2020 ). Guan, Deng, and Zhou (2020) drawing from cultural psychology, discuss how cultural orientations shape an individual's response to COVID-19, but also how a national cultural perspective influences collective actions. Kantamneni (2020) emphasized the effects on marginalized populations in the United States, as well as the very real effects of racism for Asians and Asian-Americans in the US. Kramer and Kramer (2020) discuss the impact of the pandemic in the perceptions of various occupations, whether perceptions of “good” and “bad” jobs will change and whether working remotely will permanently change where people will want to work. Restubog, Ocampo, and Wang (2020) also focused on individual's responses to the global crisis, concentrating on emotional regulation as a challenge, with suggestions for better managing the stress surrounding the anxiety of uncertainty. Rudolph and Zacher (2020) cautioned against using a generational lens in research, advocating for a lifespan developmental approach. Spurk and Straub (2020) also review issues related to unemployment, but focus on the impact of COVID-19 specifically on “gig” or flexible work arrangements.

I am grateful for the contributions of these groups of scholars, and proud of their ability to write these. They were able to write constructive essays in a short time frame when they were, themselves, dealing with disruptions at work. Some were home-schooling children, some were worried about an absent partner or a vulnerable loved one, some were struggling with the challenges that Restubog et al. (2020) outlined. I hope the thoughts, suggestions, and recommendations in these essays will help to stimulate productive thought on the effect of COVID-19 on work and workers. And, while, I hope this research spurs to better understand the effects of such shocks on work, I really hope we do not have to cope with such a shock again.

• Akkermans J., Richardson J., Kraimer M. The Covid-19 crisis as a career shock: Implications for careers and vocational behavior. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Blustein D.L., Duffy R., Ferreira J.A., Cohen-Scali V., Cinamon R.G., Allan B.A. Unemployment in the time of COVID-19: A research agenda. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Bureau of Labor Statistics (2020). Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey. Retrieved May 6, 2020 from https://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/surveymost .
• Cho E. Examining boundaries to understand the impact of COVID-19 on vocational behaviors. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Guan Y., Deng H., Zhou X. Understanding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on career development: Insights from cultural psychology. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Johns Hopkins (2020) Coronavirus Outbreak Mapped: Retrieved May 5, 2020 from https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html .
• International Labor Organization ILO monitor: COVID-19 and the world of work. Third edition updated estimates and analysis. 2020. https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/documents/briefingnote/wcms_743146.pdf Retrieved May 5, 2020 from:
• International Labor Organization (2020b) COVID-19 impact on the collection of labour market statistics. Retrieved May 6, 2020 from: https://ilostat.ilo.org .
• Kantamneni, N. (2020). The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on marginalized populations in the United States: A research agenda. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 119 . [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ]
• Kramer A., Kramer K.Z. The potential impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on occupational status, work from home, and occupational mobility. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Leitheiser, E., Hossain, S.N., Shuvro, S., Tasnim, G., Moon, J., Knudsen, J.S., & Rahman, S. (2020). Early impacts of coronavirus on Bangladesh apparel supply chains. https://www.cbs.dk/files/cbs.dk/risc_report_-_impacts_of_coronavirus_on_bangladesh_rmg_1.pdf .
• Restubog S.L.D., Ocampo A.C., Wang L. Taking control amidst the Chaos: Emotion regulation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Rudolph C.W., Zacher H. COVID-19 and careers: On the futility of generational explanations. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Spurk D., Straub C. Flexible employment relationships and careers in times of the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 2020; 119 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• World Health Organization (2020). World Health Organization Coronavirus Update. Retrieved May 5, 2020 from: https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019 .

Manager attention, policy uncertainty, and stock market

This thesis has three essays that study the intersections of macroeconomics, finance, and text analysis. The topics include executives' attention and financial decisions, economic policy uncertainty and stock market forecasting, and the stock market performance in the time of the Covid-19 pandemic. The essays hope to provide unique measurements of attention and uncertainty, empirical evidence, and theories to understand the connections and differences between classic theories and agents' behavior in actual economic activities. The first essay is my job market paper. I examine the attention of executive managers and their financing behavior, focusing on the information acquisition process. Corporations are sensitive to both macroeconomic and firm-specific challenges. Executives must choose overall attention capacity and divide finite attention between these topics. By using natural language processing and quarterly earnings call transcripts, I assess the information content of this dialog. The attention capacity quantifies the effective information used to make borrowing decisions, consisting of information processing macro and firm-specific issues. The attention allocation measures the ratio of attention paid to macroeconomics. Executives make two critical decisions during the information acquiring process. First, executives decide the overall attention capacity, determined by the general uncertainty. Second, executives decide the optimal attention allocated between macro and firm-specific topics. In the rise of uncertainty from either subject, executives' attention capacity increases (scale effect) and assign greater awareness to this topic (substitution effect). I show that the substitution effect is higher than the scale effect. Using an optimal static capital structure model with endogenous information choice, I demonstrate that an executive can tolerate a higher leverage rate when actively acquiring information. Thus, the information decision process is crucial to understanding the recent rising leverage phenomenon. The second essay examines the relationship between the stock market performance and the economic activities in the time of Covid-19. Stock prices and workplace mobility trace out striking clockwise paths in daily data from mid-February to late May 2020. Global stock prices fell 30 percent from February 17 to March 12, before mobility declined. Over the next 11 days, stocks fell another 10 percentage points as mobility dropped 40 percent. From March 23 to April 9, stocks recovered half their losses, and mobility decreased further. From April 9 to late May, both stocks and mobility rose modestly. This dynamic plays out across the 35 countries in our sample, with notable departures in China, South Korea, and Taiwan. The size of the global stock market crash in reaction to the pandemic is many times larger than a standard asset-pricing model implies. Looking more closely at the world's two largest economies, the pandemic had greater effects on stock market levels and volatilities in the U.S. than in China, even before it became evident that early U.S. containment efforts would flounder. Newspaper-based narrative evidence confirms the dominant – and historically unprecedented – the role of pandemic-related developments in the stock market behavior of both countries. The third essay tests the prediction power of the mainland China Economic Policy Uncertainty in forecasting the Chinese stock market. Rational asset pricing theory indicates that the fluctuations of the real economy have a significant impact on the stock market. The Chinese stock market is highly regulated and sensitive to regulations and market policies uncertainty. Using an efficient Dynamic Model Averaging (eDMA) model, this paper investigates how well the newspaper-based Economic Policy Uncertainty (EPU) index can predict the returns of the Chinese Shanghai Stock Exchange Index. Empirical evidence shows that EPU mutes the impact of monetary policy as a predictor. Also, eDMA significantly improves the forecasting performance compared to other forecasting methodologies.

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Why the Pandemic Probably Started in a Lab, in 5 Key Points

By Alina Chan

Dr. Chan is a molecular biologist at the Broad Institute of M.I.T. and Harvard, and a co-author of “Viral: The Search for the Origin of Covid-19.”

On Monday, Dr. Anthony Fauci will return to the halls of Congress to testify before the House subcommittee investigating the Covid-19 pandemic. He will most likely be questioned about how the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which he directed until retiring in 2022, supported risky virus work at a Chinese institute whose research may have caused the pandemic.

For more than four years, reflexive partisan politics have derailed the search for the truth about a catastrophe that has touched us all. It has been estimated that at least 25 million people around the world have died because of Covid-19, with over a million of those deaths in the United States.

Although how the pandemic started has been hotly debated, a growing volume of evidence — gleaned from public records released under the Freedom of Information Act, digital sleuthing through online databases, scientific papers analyzing the virus and its spread, and leaks from within the U.S. government — suggests that the pandemic most likely occurred because a virus escaped from a research lab in Wuhan, China. If so, it would be the most costly accident in the history of science.

Here’s what we now know:

1 The SARS-like virus that caused the pandemic emerged in Wuhan, the city where the world’s foremost research lab for SARS-like viruses is located.

• At the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a team of scientists had been hunting for SARS-like viruses for over a decade, led by Shi Zhengli.
• Their research showed that the viruses most similar to SARS‑CoV‑2, the virus that caused the pandemic, circulate in bats that live r oughly 1,000 miles away from Wuhan. Scientists from Dr. Shi’s team traveled repeatedly to Yunnan province to collect these viruses and had expanded their search to Southeast Asia. Bats in other parts of China have not been found to carry viruses that are as closely related to SARS-CoV-2.

The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 were found in southwestern China and in Laos.

Large cities

Mine in Yunnan province

Cave in Laos

South China Sea

The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2

were found in southwestern China and in Laos.

philippines

The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 were found

in southwestern China and Laos.

Sources: Sarah Temmam et al., Nature; SimpleMaps

Note: Cities shown have a population of at least 200,000.

There are hundreds of large cities in China and Southeast Asia.

There are hundreds of large cities in China

and Southeast Asia.

The pandemic started roughly 1,000 miles away, in Wuhan, home to the world’s foremost SARS-like virus research lab.

The pandemic started roughly 1,000 miles away,

in Wuhan, home to the world’s foremost SARS-like virus research lab.

The pandemic started roughly 1,000 miles away, in Wuhan,

home to the world’s foremost SARS-like virus research lab.

• Even at hot spots where these viruses exist naturally near the cave bats of southwestern China and Southeast Asia, the scientists argued, as recently as 2019 , that bat coronavirus spillover into humans is rare .
• When the Covid-19 outbreak was detected, Dr. Shi initially wondered if the novel coronavirus had come from her laboratory , saying she had never expected such an outbreak to occur in Wuhan.
• The SARS‑CoV‑2 virus is exceptionally contagious and can jump from species to species like wildfire . Yet it left no known trace of infection at its source or anywhere along what would have been a thousand-mile journey before emerging in Wuhan.

2 The year before the outbreak, the Wuhan institute, working with U.S. partners, had proposed creating viruses with SARS‑CoV‑2’s defining feature.

• Dr. Shi’s group was fascinated by how coronaviruses jump from species to species. To find viruses, they took samples from bats and other animals , as well as from sick people living near animals carrying these viruses or associated with the wildlife trade. Much of this work was conducted in partnership with the EcoHealth Alliance, a U.S.-based scientific organization that, since 2002, has been awarded over $80 million in federal funding to research the risks of emerging infectious diseases.
• The laboratory pursued risky research that resulted in viruses becoming more infectious : Coronaviruses were grown from samples from infected animals and genetically reconstructed and recombined to create new viruses unknown in nature. These new viruses were passed through cells from bats, pigs, primates and humans and were used to infect civets and humanized mice (mice modified with human genes). In essence, this process forced these viruses to adapt to new host species, and the viruses with mutations that allowed them to thrive emerged as victors.
• By 2019, Dr. Shi’s group had published a database describing more than 22,000 collected wildlife samples. But external access was shut off in the fall of 2019, and the database was not shared with American collaborators even after the pandemic started , when such a rich virus collection would have been most useful in tracking the origin of SARS‑CoV‑2. It remains unclear whether the Wuhan institute possessed a precursor of the pandemic virus.
• In 2021, The Intercept published a leaked 2018 grant proposal for a research project named Defuse , which had been written as a collaboration between EcoHealth, the Wuhan institute and Ralph Baric at the University of North Carolina, who had been on the cutting edge of coronavirus research for years. The proposal described plans to create viruses strikingly similar to SARS‑CoV‑2.
• Coronaviruses bear their name because their surface is studded with protein spikes, like a spiky crown, which they use to enter animal cells. Although never funded by the United States , the Defuse project proposed to search for and create SARS-like viruses carrying spikes with a unique feature: a furin cleavage site — the same feature that enhances SARS‑CoV‑2’s infectiousness in humans, making it capable of causing a pandemic.

The Wuhan lab ran risky experiments to learn about how SARS-like viruses might infect humans.

1. Collect SARS-like viruses from bats and other wild animals, as well as from people exposed to them.

2. Identify high-risk viruses by screening for spike proteins that facilitate infection of human cells.

2. Identify high-risk viruses by screening for spike proteins that facilitate infection of

human cells.

In Defuse, the scientists proposed to add a furin cleavage site to the spike protein.

3. Create new coronaviruses by inserting spike proteins or other features that could make the viruses more infectious in humans.

4. Infect human cells, civets and humanized mice with the new coronaviruses, to determine how dangerous they might be.

• While it’s possible that the furin cleavage site could have evolved naturally (as seen in some distantly related coronaviruses), out of the hundreds of SARS-like viruses cataloged by scientists, SARS‑CoV‑2 is the only one known to possess a furin cleavage site in its spike. And the genetic data suggest that the virus had only recently gained the furin cleavage site before it started the pandemic.
• Ultimately, a never-before-seen SARS-like virus with a newly introduced furin cleavage site, matching the description in the Wuhan institute’s Defuse proposal, caused an outbreak in Wuhan less than two years after the proposal was drafted.
• When the Wuhan scientists published their seminal paper about Covid-19 as the pandemic roared to life in 2020, they did not mention the virus’s furin cleavage site — a feature they should have been on the lookout for, according to their own grant proposal, and a feature quickly recognized by other scientists.
• Worse still, as the pandemic raged, their American collaborators failed to publicly reveal the existence of the Defuse proposal. The president of EcoHealth, Peter Daszak, recently admitted to Congress that he doesn’t know about virus samples collected by the Wuhan institute after 2015 and never asked the lab’s scientists if they had started the work described in Defuse. In May, citing failures in EcoHealth’s monitoring of risky experiments conducted at the Wuhan lab, the Biden administration suspended all federal funding for the organization and Dr. Daszak and initiated proceedings to bar them from receiving future grants.
• Separately, Dr. Baric described the competitive dynamic between his research group and the institute when he told Congress that the Wuhan scientists would probably not have shared their most interesting newly discovered viruses with him . Documents and email correspondence between the institute and Dr. Baric are still being withheld from the public while their release is fiercely contested in litigation.
• In the end, American partners very likely knew of only a fraction of the research done in Wuhan. According to U.S. intelligence sources, some of the institute’s virus research was classified or conducted with or on behalf of the Chinese military .

3 The Wuhan lab pursued this type of work under low biosafety conditions that could not have contained an airborne virus as infectious as SARS‑CoV‑2.

• Labs working with live viruses generally operate at one of four biosafety levels (known in ascending order of stringency as BSL-1, 2, 3 and 4) that describe the work practices that are considered sufficiently safe depending on the characteristics of each pathogen. The Wuhan institute’s scientists worked with SARS-like viruses under inappropriately low biosafety conditions .

In the United States, virologists generally use stricter Biosafety Level 3 protocols when working with SARS-like viruses.

Biosafety cabinets prevent

viral particles from escaping.

Viral particles

Personal respirators provide

a second layer of defense against breathing in the virus.

DIRECT CONTACT

Gloves prevent skin contact.

Disposable wraparound

gowns cover much of the rest of the body.

Personal respirators provide a second layer of defense against breathing in the virus.

Disposable wraparound gowns

cover much of the rest of the body.

Note: ​​Biosafety levels are not internationally standardized, and some countries use more permissive protocols than others.

The Wuhan lab had been regularly working with SARS-like viruses under Biosafety Level 2 conditions, which could not prevent a highly infectious virus like SARS-CoV-2 from escaping.

Some work is done in the open air, and masks are not required.

Less protective equipment provides more opportunities

for contamination.

Some work is done in the open air,

and masks are not required.

Less protective equipment provides more opportunities for contamination.

• In one experiment, Dr. Shi’s group genetically engineered an unexpectedly deadly SARS-like virus (not closely related to SARS‑CoV‑2) that exhibited a 10,000-fold increase in the quantity of virus in the lungs and brains of humanized mice . Wuhan institute scientists handled these live viruses at low biosafet y levels , including BSL-2.
• Even the much more stringent containment at BSL-3 cannot fully prevent SARS‑CoV‑2 from escaping . Two years into the pandemic, the virus infected a scientist in a BSL-3 laboratory in Taiwan, which was, at the time, a zero-Covid country. The scientist had been vaccinated and was tested only after losing the sense of smell. By then, more than 100 close contacts had been exposed. Human error is a source of exposure even at the highest biosafety levels , and the risks are much greater for scientists working with infectious pathogens at low biosafety.
• An early draft of the Defuse proposal stated that the Wuhan lab would do their virus work at BSL-2 to make it “highly cost-effective.” Dr. Baric added a note to the draft highlighting the importance of using BSL-3 to contain SARS-like viruses that could infect human cells, writing that “U.S. researchers will likely freak out.” Years later, after SARS‑CoV‑2 had killed millions, Dr. Baric wrote to Dr. Daszak : “I have no doubt that they followed state determined rules and did the work under BSL-2. Yes China has the right to set their own policy. You believe this was appropriate containment if you want but don’t expect me to believe it. Moreover, don’t insult my intelligence by trying to feed me this load of BS.”
• SARS‑CoV‑2 is a stealthy virus that transmits effectively through the air, causes a range of symptoms similar to those of other common respiratory diseases and can be spread by infected people before symptoms even appear. If the virus had escaped from a BSL-2 laboratory in 2019, the leak most likely would have gone undetected until too late.
• One alarming detail — leaked to The Wall Street Journal and confirmed by current and former U.S. government officials — is that scientists on Dr. Shi’s team fell ill with Covid-like symptoms in the fall of 2019 . One of the scientists had been named in the Defuse proposal as the person in charge of virus discovery work. The scientists denied having been sick .

4 The hypothesis that Covid-19 came from an animal at the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan is not supported by strong evidence.

• In December 2019, Chinese investigators assumed the outbreak had started at a centrally located market frequented by thousands of visitors daily. This bias in their search for early cases meant that cases unlinked to or located far away from the market would very likely have been missed. To make things worse, the Chinese authorities blocked the reporting of early cases not linked to the market and, claiming biosafety precautions, ordered the destruction of patient samples on January 3, 2020, making it nearly impossible to see the complete picture of the earliest Covid-19 cases. Information about dozens of early cases from November and December 2019 remains inaccessible.
• A pair of papers published in Science in 2022 made the best case for SARS‑CoV‑2 having emerged naturally from human-animal contact at the Wuhan market by focusing on a map of the early cases and asserting that the virus had jumped from animals into humans twice at the market in 2019. More recently, the two papers have been countered by other virologists and scientists who convincingly demonstrate that the available market evidence does not distinguish between a human superspreader event and a natural spillover at the market.
• Furthermore, the existing genetic and early case data show that all known Covid-19 cases probably stem from a single introduction of SARS‑CoV‑2 into people, and the outbreak at the Wuhan market probably happened after the virus had already been circulating in humans.

An analysis of SARS-CoV-2’s evolutionary tree shows how the virus evolved as it started to spread through humans.

SARS-COV-2 Viruses closest

to bat coronaviruses

more mutations

Source: Lv et al., Virus Evolution (2024) , as reproduced by Jesse Bloom

The viruses that infected people linked to the market were most likely not the earliest form of the virus that seeded the pandemic.

• Not a single infected animal has ever been confirmed at the market or in its supply chain. Without good evidence that the pandemic started at the Huanan Seafood Market, the fact that the virus emerged in Wuhan points squarely at its unique SARS-like virus laboratory.

5 Key evidence that would be expected if the virus had emerged from the wildlife trade is still missing.

In previous outbreaks of coronaviruses, scientists were able to demonstrate natural origin by collecting multiple pieces of evidence linking infected humans to infected animals.

Infected animals

Earliest known

cases exposed to

live animals

Antibody evidence

of animals and

animal traders having

been infected

Ancestral variants

of the virus found in

Documented trade

of host animals

between the area

where bats carry

closely related viruses

and the outbreak site

Infected animals found

Earliest known cases exposed to live animals

Antibody evidence of animals and animal

traders having been infected

Ancestral variants of the virus found in animals

Documented trade of host animals

between the area where bats carry closely

related viruses and the outbreak site

For SARS-CoV-2, these same key pieces of evidence are still missing , more than four years after the virus emerged.

For SARS-CoV-2, these same key pieces of evidence are still missing ,

more than four years after the virus emerged.

• Despite the intense search trained on the animal trade and people linked to the market, investigators have not reported finding any animals infected with SARS‑CoV‑2 that had not been infected by humans. Yet, infected animal sources and other connective pieces of evidence were found for the earlier SARS and MERS outbreaks as quickly as within a few days, despite the less advanced viral forensic technologies of two decades ago.
• Even though Wuhan is the home base of virus hunters with world-leading expertise in tracking novel SARS-like viruses, investigators have either failed to collect or report key evidence that would be expected if Covid-19 emerged from the wildlife trade . For example, investigators have not determined that the earliest known cases had exposure to intermediate host animals before falling ill. No antibody evidence shows that animal traders in Wuhan are regularly exposed to SARS-like viruses, as would be expected in such situations.
• With today’s technology, scientists can detect how respiratory viruses — including SARS, MERS and the flu — circulate in animals while making repeated attempts to jump across species . Thankfully, these variants usually fail to transmit well after crossing over to a new species and tend to die off after a small number of infections. In contrast, virologists and other scientists agree that SARS‑CoV‑2 required little to no adaptation to spread rapidly in humans and other animals . The virus appears to have succeeded in causing a pandemic upon its only detected jump into humans.

The pandemic could have been caused by any of hundreds of virus species, at any of tens of thousands of wildlife markets, in any of thousands of cities, and in any year. But it was a SARS-like coronavirus with a unique furin cleavage site that emerged in Wuhan, less than two years after scientists, sometimes working under inadequate biosafety conditions, proposed collecting and creating viruses of that same design.

While several natural spillover scenarios remain plausible, and we still don’t know enough about the full extent of virus research conducted at the Wuhan institute by Dr. Shi’s team and other researchers, a laboratory accident is the most parsimonious explanation of how the pandemic began.

Given what we now know, investigators should follow their strongest leads and subpoena all exchanges between the Wuhan scientists and their international partners, including unpublished research proposals, manuscripts, data and commercial orders. In particular, exchanges from 2018 and 2019 — the critical two years before the emergence of Covid-19 — are very likely to be illuminating (and require no cooperation from the Chinese government to acquire), yet they remain beyond the public’s view more than four years after the pandemic began.

Whether the pandemic started on a lab bench or in a market stall, it is undeniable that U.S. federal funding helped to build an unprecedented collection of SARS-like viruses at the Wuhan institute, as well as contributing to research that enhanced them . Advocates and funders of the institute’s research, including Dr. Fauci, should cooperate with the investigation to help identify and close the loopholes that allowed such dangerous work to occur. The world must not continue to bear the intolerable risks of research with the potential to cause pandemics .

A successful investigation of the pandemic’s root cause would have the power to break a decades-long scientific impasse on pathogen research safety, determining how governments will spend billions of dollars to prevent future pandemics. A credible investigation would also deter future acts of negligence and deceit by demonstrating that it is indeed possible to be held accountable for causing a viral pandemic. Last but not least, people of all nations need to see their leaders — and especially, their scientists — heading the charge to find out what caused this world-shaking event. Restoring public trust in science and government leadership requires it.

A thorough investigation by the U.S. government could unearth more evidence while spurring whistleblowers to find their courage and seek their moment of opportunity. It would also show the world that U.S. leaders and scientists are not afraid of what the truth behind the pandemic may be.

More on how the pandemic may have started

Where Did the Coronavirus Come From? What We Already Know Is Troubling.

Even if the coronavirus did not emerge from a lab, the groundwork for a potential disaster had been laid for years, and learning its lessons is essential to preventing others.

By Zeynep Tufekci

Why Does Bad Science on Covid’s Origin Get Hyped?

If the raccoon dog was a smoking gun, it fired blanks.

By David Wallace-Wells

A Plea for Making Virus Research Safer

A way forward for lab safety.

By Jesse Bloom

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Alina Chan ( @ayjchan ) is a molecular biologist at the Broad Institute of M.I.T. and Harvard, and a co-author of “ Viral : The Search for the Origin of Covid-19.” She was a member of the Pathogens Project , which the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists organized to generate new thinking on responsible, high-risk pathogen research.

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