The COVID-19 global pandemic caused by novel coronavirus has already impacted the world in a much adverse way. From causing global lockdowns to changes in human behavior, the virus has managed to make us rethink the way we act, work, and overall live our life.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended social distancing as one of the most effective ways to decelerate the spread rate. This has already imperiled one of the primary needs of human beings – physical touch and intimacy. One of other major concerns revolves around the question, “Will we be able to trust people the same way?”

Let’s dissect.

It is completely normal for humans to question a new environment, situation, event, object, or another human being. This is because the new environment comes with uncertainty, which jeopardizes our needs for control and sense of security. And not only new people, the skepticism grows towards known people, who have come in contact with unknown environments, too. With this scenario in mind, the surficial answer to the question reaches to “NO!”, but there is more to this picture.

HOW DO WE TRUST?

Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman write about the 3 elements of trust – positive relationships, good judgement/expertise, and consistency. Positive relationships are about balancing results with concern for others, generating cooperation between others, resolving conflicts, and giving honest feedback in a helpful way. Good judgement and expertise is about anticipating and responding quickly to problems, using knowledge and expertise to achieve results, and even others seeking after their opinions. Finally, consistency is about walking the talk, honoring commitments, keeping promises, and willing to go above and beyond the regular call of duty.

Frances Frei’s TED Talk also gives a similar three elements of trust, viz. the trust triangle – authenticity (I experience the real you), empathy (I believe you care about me and my success), and logic (I know you can do it; your reasoning and judgement are sound).

Professor Dan Ariely in his paper, The Trust Factory, explains about five different trust generators – i) The long game: established relationships, ii) The glass door: transparency, iii) The why factor: intentionality, iv) The counterpunch: revenge, and finally v) The common goal: aligned incentives.

In simple words, he explains these five trust generators as:

i) With consistent partners, people are more trusting.
ii) We are more comfortable when we can see what’s going on behind the scenes.
iii) We are judged less harshly if we suffer as we struggle with moral dilemmas.
iv) The possibility of punishment helps us avoid relationships in which one side is more vulnerable than the other.
v) Sacrificing some income for the benefit of the other party can be an incredibly powerful act.

WHAT DOES THIS TELL ABOUT TRUST?

Simply put, a lot of factors affect whether we trust or do not trust another person, organization, object, or a situation. Summarizing these different literatures, I firmly believe trust comes from consistent acts demonstrating genuine concern for others, keeping others’ best interests at heart, and logical actions with transparent intentions.

SO, WILL WE BE ABLE TO TRUST OTHERS?

In the worst case, we will see everyone with the same lens – “Could s/he be the carrier of the virus?” We might be skeptical towards the family member who has been in three different meetings throughout the day. We will certainly raise an eyebrow on that customer who looks ill and is continuously coughing without covering their mouth. We might even hesitate to shake hands with a new colleague who just joined the work today.

But the point is that all these do not necessarily stop us from trusting people ever again. Yes, we will be cautious and aware. We will change our behaviors in pursuit to co-exist with the virus. But we will not stop trusting people altogether. The key lies in how we communicate with people. The messages we are sending across needs to mention that we are genuinely concerned for them, have their best interest at heart, and act logically with transparent intentions. We need to recognize the other person’s dilemma, and also need to explain ours.

This might sound absurd at the beginning but certain changes are bound to happen, and happen for the overall good.

Touchwood, let’s hope the pandemic fades quick.

While Noor Tasnim from Duke Global Health Institute was expected to stay in Guatemala for eight weeks, she worried if she would ever fit in. Her advisor, Dr. David Boyd, recommended her to greet every stranger she walked by. Noor goes on to write in her news article that by acknowledging others in the community and having that acknowledgement reciprocated, she felt connected to the locals. Little did she know that such a common greeting could be so powerful.

This makes us wonder, “how do we generally greet our friends, family, or loved ones?” It has mostly been a hug, handshake, fist bump, shoulder bump, or a kiss. Sometimes, just a smile from distance works too. Mostly, the physical touch is important.

THE HUMAN TOUCH

Dacher Keltner, Ph.D. – the founding director of the Greater Good Science Center and a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley – writes that everyday incidental gestures such as pat on the back, or caress of the arm are our primary language of compassion, and a primary means for spreading compassion. In his article published in September 2010, he explains that “to touch is to give life”.

Furthermore, in this journal article published by French physiologist Nicolas Guéguen, he instructed the professor of a 120-person statistics class to give the same verbal encouragement to any student who volunteered to solve a problem at the front of his classroom. But to a randomly selected group of students within the class, the professor also gave a slight tap on the upper arm when speaking to them. Guéguen compared the volunteer rate of those who were touched to those who were not, and found that students who were touched were significantly more likely to volunteer again. In fact, roughly 28 percent of those who were touched volunteered again, compared with about nine percent of those who were not. This demonstrates the positive effect of touch in schools, and how important touch is in communicating positive emotions.

Even in business meetings, handshakes are considered an important part. In a working paper published by Harvard Business School, Juliana Schroeder and Jane Risen of University of Chicago, and Francesca Gino and Michael I. Norton of Harvard University conducted four different studies. These four different studies revealed that handshakes made people feel comfortable initiating negotiations, led to increased cooperative behaviors, obtained higher joint outcomes, crafted more agreements, and in together promoted the adoption of cooperative strategies and influenced negotiation outcomes.

A DIFFICULT PREDICAMENT

While personal touch and intimacy itself is one of the basic human needs, coronavirus hits hard at this very basic human need. Preventing the spread of coronavirus requires hand washing and social distancing. Those are the basics – wash your hands with soap water for at least 20 seconds regularly, and maintaining social distance. As Harvard Medical School elaborates the term social distancing it goes like, “For an individual, it refers to maintaining enough distance (6 feet or more) between yourself and another person to avoid getting infected or infecting someone else.”

This could be the biggest behavioral shift and a major problem for humans, in general.

MIT Technology Review’s editor in chief, Gideon Lichfield, advocates in his article that we are not going back to normal, and social distancing could itself be the new normal – upending our way of life, in some ways forever. Peter Hall – the Professor of School of Public Health and Health Systems at University of Waterloo – advocates in his article published in World Economic Forum that the vaccine will eventually arrive, but in the meantime, epidemics like COVID-19 can be prevented by increasing the prevalence of precautionary behaviors in the general population that impede its spread.

In similar lines, the BBC Future also predicts that we – humans – will be less touchy-feely and far more wary, and the transition will feel strange. It also goes on to say that we may find ourselves more comfortable with keeping people at a distance from us when we greet them.

A RAY OF HOPE?

The Independent newspaper published an article back in 2015 stating that handshakes during business negotiations work even when one of the parties involved is a robot.

A scientific study found that when two people who may be located thousands of miles apart communicate through a robot, shaking hands with the machine and communicating the physical act still encouraged co-operation and mutual understanding.

As per the research team, even though the handshake was virtual, it created a sense of connectedness between both people as they experienced the sensation of grasping a hand with a vibration generated through a controller. They further go on to mention that the findings could provoke a revolution in the art of conducting a video conference or Skype interview.

Also Read: Will we be able to trust people the same way?

Robin Dunbar, emeritus professor of evolutionary psychology at Oxford University, goes on to say that physical contact is a part of the mechanism we use to set up our relationships, friendships, and family memberships. As published in this BBC Future article, Dunbar has some words of hope. “Touch is not the only mechanism used for physical bonding,” he says. Evolution from our primate progenitors has given us new ways to feel a connection with others that also trigger endorphins. “They’re things like laughter, singing, dancing, telling stories, religious rituals and so on,” he says – “the things we use in our everyday social interactions.”

While we might remain more cautious about physical contact for the time being, physical – or – social distance doesn’t really mean we can’t feel close.

This lockdown has given me ample time to reflect back not just on my own thoughts, feelings and behaviors, but also understand the general human behavior as a whole. While most of the stated behavior looks obvious and nothing new, that is where the point in writing this article lies. Humans tend to overlook “obvious”, as defined by the psychology of willful ignorance or blindness.

In her book, Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril, Margaret Heffernan explains the concept of willful blindness in context of legal system as:

It refers to a situation where — if an individual could have and should have known something, then the law treats it as if he knew it. The claim of not knowing isn’t a sufficient defense. Heffernan notes: “The law doesn’t care why you remain ignorant, only that you do.”

Also Read: Why are we so confused?

This basic and obvious understanding of human behavior is crucial to understand other people better, and therefore, manage personal and professional relationships better.

For ease of understanding and segregation, the general behaviors are divided according to fundamental human needs. A small, but important disclaimer is required here, because these common human behaviors are generalized (and definitely NOT stereotyped) on my limited viewpoint and assumptions only.

On Subsistence:

This is the need for survival, safety, security, and control. Humans are seeking to be more financially secure by postponing big-purchase decisions. They have this economic pressure of paying rent, day-to-day groceries, medications, and also have to keep aside a contingent reserve for future uncertainties. People are focusing largely on health and sanitation. Job security has become a large concern, especially with the lockdown crippling the economy. People have the fear of losing their job, or receiving a pay-cut, or furlough.

Given that humans generally want certainty and prefer to take control over situations, some people have stocked (or even hoarded) resources needed for survival. This need for control and certainty has triggered a horrific and disgusting face of humans – they want to eliminate outside threats. In pursuit to eliminate the threats, some people have taken extreme irrational measures – taking down bridges connecting two districts, blocking road access, or even xenophobic remarks and death threats to the coronavirus positive patient.

On Self Care & Recreation:

For self-care, people have not been able to go to gym work-outs or even their regular futsal games. People have opted to perform home-based exercises even with limited resources. Some people have started self-care in form of yoga and meditations, which is definitely one of many positive takeaways from the lockdown. People’s leisure and recreational needs in terms of traveling and exploring new places is hampered the most. To overcome this, people have resorted to cooking new recipes, Netflix and other on-demand video streams, and even playing online and offline games with friends and family.

On Understanding & Growth:

Humans have this need for acquiring knowledge, comprehending the knowledge, and applying the understood knowledge for greater wisdom. People have learnt new recipes, read new books, explored themselves, and gathered new facts and information about various subject matters. People also have taken this lockdown time for enrolling in various online free courses and participating in webinars. These would – hopefully – expedite their mastery and growth over the subject matter of their interest.

For the working population, few of their works are now being done from home. This has triggered the need to teach themselves with technology usage. Use of internet, web-based software, video-conferencing, and online collaboration are probably at all time high. The late majority and laggards (as defined in the Diffusion of Innovation Curve) are now finally adopting the remote and virtual way of working.

However, on the flip side of consuming information comes misleading and fake news that quickly spreads around the social networks. The lack of people verifying the authenticity and credibility of such misleading and fake information seems to be a major threat for the community as a whole. To combat these, fact-checking sites such as Nepal Fact Check have also evolved rapidly during the lockdown.

On Connection & Love:

Humans crave for connection, love, belongingness, care, acceptance, and even touch and physical contact. The lockdown period has definitely brought some people close to their family as a result of being at home all the time. On the flipside, some people (especially migrant workers) are stuck in foreign countries and are dying to come back home. Some people have swam across the Mahakali river to get back to their motherland. Some people have adventured numerous days’ journey on foot to go back home, be it in hope or despair.

To keep up with peers, friends, and colleagues, people have started various “challenges” in social media apart from regular video calls. From posting pictures clad in beautiful sarees, to reminiscing when they first met together, people have craved for connection. Dalgona coffee, Instagram Bingos are just other examples which state the obvious – people do crave for connection.

With the nature of the coronavirus itself, the touch and physical contact are at the threat. Being forced to isolate and maintain a distance, some people will have a hard time keeping their hands off their loved ones. I’m assuming the hug to your loved one(s) after lockdown ends (and hopefully the pandemic ends too) is going to be a very special one.

People are working from home to keep up with their work, but this has also impacted the need for love and connection from their family members. For some people working from home, they have found themselves working for more hours, stressing more, and eventually exhausting themselves more. This culture is making some people’s life hard in terms of managing their work, family, and self.

On Creation & Contribution:

While humans crave for love and care, they also have this need for creating something, contributing to others, serving people and community, and making the world around us better.

People are using all local resources available for keeping things on-going. There have been wonderful examples of COVID testing booths being made in Nepal with locally available resources, the Personnel Protective Equipment (PPE) being stitched locally and distributed without any charges, and so on. Brands have collaborated together to make daily groceries and necessary equipment available to their doorsteps at this time of crisis. Businesses are being creative with alternate services and products and thus, generating sources for sustaining.

People are fulfilling this need to give and do for others (contribution) by helping the daily wage earners, collecting funds, assisting them with relief items, and so on. This demonstrates the empathy humans have within ourselves. However, the question still remains at large about empathy when it comes to treating COVID affected people as criminals.

On Identity & Purpose:

During this time of crisis, people’s need for recognition, status, identity, significance, and purpose have largely been secondary. This could primarily be because of human beings’ need for survival is larger than identity and purpose in this time of crisis. However, I have seen some circumstances where some people have been reinforcing their identity via social networks, as well as some people realizing new found identity as well as purpose of life, during this time of crisis.

These were the basic human behaviors that I managed to identify with my own set of observations. I’m sure I have missed out a lot. Help me complete it by making me aware of it.

I’M SORRY.

My previous article might have provoked productivity guilt to some people, and I’m genuinely sorry if it has.

I wrote that article to help people solve the lockdown boredom conundrum, but I can understand for some people it might also have triggered a guilt. There are two sides of a coin – as always. However, I am – NOW – aware of this other side.

What are you talking about?

During this lockdown, a lot of people have utilized their free time into doing something “productive” – cooking, drawing, reading, learning, crafting, singing, dancing, playing music, and so much. Some people have found a new passion, or a new hobby to go along with and spend their days. Some people have completed physical exercise challenges in pursuit to their healthy living. Some people have had quality family time and meaningful conversations. Some people have looked inwards and asked self-reflective questions to explore more about themselves. This made so much sense to me.

And then I stumbled upon a quote, “This is a pandemic, not a productivity contest.” This made even more sense.

The bottom line here is about the guilt that arises from doing none of the things mentioned above.

So, what is productivity guilt?

Scott Young defines productivity guilt as:

“It’s the constant nagging feeling that you should be doing more. And if you’re not doing everything, then you’re a lazy slacker who will never reach your goals.”

– Scott Young

This definition right there is what productivity guilt is all about. It is about the constant guilt of doing nothing or doing not enough, per se.

Some people might have spent days doing nothing, sleeping, binge-watching series, or even sharing memes all day long. These people haven’t done regular exercise, enrolled into some class or activity, learnt a new language, read books and articles, invested in something, acquired a new skill, or did something fancy number crunching on spreadsheets. This is what the “generally accepted” definition of being “productive” is labeled as. This definition pressurizes people and implants the guilt of being “lazy slacker” and “unproductive”. Are these people really not being “productive”?

How does this productivity guilt form?

For students who have their exams lingering right after the end of lockdown, the doom is impending on them. They have to take this humongous decision of “read and prepare for the exams” or “let the lockdown finish first”. This is a tough call. People also have to finish watching Part 4 of La Casa De Papel (Money Heist) and make “Dalgona” coffee. People also have to complete the random challenges and bingo cards on Instagram. And we can’t really ignore them because it will then ruin the social relationship. In short, we already have a lot to do in our plate.

Now this lot of things-to-do creates overstimulation in the brain, which in turn, becomes the easiest way for human brains to become distracted. As author of Hyperfocus, Chris Bailey puts it, “Our brains aren’t distracted, our brains crave for distraction because it’s overstimulated.” This distraction doesn’t let things to be completed, which gives birth to the productivity guilt. This guilt – in turn – doesn’t lessen any of our things-to-do.

This chart explains the vicious cycle:

People & Choices

Barry Schwarz, in his book “The Paradox of Choice“, says that more choices leads to more confusions. If there wasn’t any choice at the first place, there would never be any confusion.

Also Read: Why are we so confused?

The most important thing people need to understand is being aware. Being “productive” as society defines it – it’s their own choice. Being “unproductive” as society defines it – it’s again their own choice. We need to stop blaming and shaming both “productive” and “unproductive” people.

Instead of comparing ourselves to what others do from social media, what we need to do is to become aware of what we want to do. Do we want to work? Do we want to binge watch series on Netflix? Do we want to sleep? Do we want to learn new skill? Do we want to cook and try a new recipe? The starting point is about being aware. Then accept the reality that emerged from your awareness, and then act.

This aware – accept – act process is what I think we can do. And this is also what being “productive” is all about, according to the definition of “productivity”.

If you hit up the meaning of productivity in Google, the result is this:

Productivity
/prɒdʌkˈtɪvɪti/
Noun
The effectiveness of productive effort, especially in industry, as measured in terms of the rate of output per unit of input.

By this definition, productivity is all about being effective (what we do) and efficient (how we do). So, until and unless we stop doing what we intended to do, WE ALL ARE BEING PRODUCTIVE.

You wanted to have a good afternoon nap and you slept – you’re being productive. You wanted to finish one whole season in a night and you did – you’re being productive. You wanted to finish one chapter of your book and you did – you’re being productive. You wanted to cook some new recipe and you did – you’re being productive.

If you disagree, blame the dictionary.

And happy new year 2077, Nepal!