During your casual doom-scrolling sessions, many of us have stumbled upon a video that claims to explain why time suddenly feels like it’s flying by, the so-called “2020 effect.”
Most of us would agree that time since COVID-19 feels strangely distorted. The days during the pandemic seemed to move slowly, the period itself now feels unusually long, and it often seems as though the pandemic took place much further in the past than it actually did. This odd time wrap is exactly what the 2020 effect dictates!
A study was conducted that made this not just some viral TikTok theory, but a truly science and data-driven fact.
Researchers conducted a large questionnaire study examining several psychological variables such as perception of time speed, perceived duration of events, psychological temporal distance, autobiographical memory, physical activity, mental activity, and emotional state at different time periods before, during and after the pandemic.
Analysis of this data unveiled the “perfect storm” created for temporal distortion. Firstly, the widespread uncertainty and the inability to predict the future disrupted the brain's normal mechanisms for every day sequencing of events hence anchoring them in time. Secondly, the drastic reduction in social interactions and the monotony of lockdowns led to a significant decrease in the number of memorable events known as "temporal landmarks." In cognitive psychology, these landmarks are crucial for segmenting life into the past and future. Without them, time would be a blur, making it difficult for one to gauge their passage or length. Precisely what took place in 2020, it was a year filled with repetitive, uneventful days that gave us few distinct memories leading to time feeling painfully slow in the moment, yet in memory the entire period blends together into one long, indistinct block.
Subsequently, high levels of stress, anxiety, and negative emotions affect an individual's memory and attention, influencing a phenomenon known as autobiographical memory strength - the vividness, emotional intensity, and accuracy with which individuals recall personal life events. During the pandemic, when people were highly stressed, they focused intensely on the present, which can lead to a more detailed, albeit fragmented, encoding of the immediate environment. This made time feel like it slowed down. Later, when one recalled this period, these strong emotions often overshadowed the actual events, making the time feel both long and compressed.
Ultimately, these events have proven to us that time isn't fixed, rather our sense of time is actively created by our brain, depending on our feelings, surroundings, and experiences. It may have previously seemed as though we would never be able to restore our perception of time however over the years through routine, new experiences and planning for the future our brains have eventually started to feel a sense of normal again.
In the end at least we had TikTok by our side feeding our every doom session, teaching us something new from the renegade to making dalgona coffee, keeping us connected to the world even within our four walls.
