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Home > Sunday Mid Day News > Heres how to manage without hugs in post COVID 19 world

Here's how to manage without hugs in post COVID-19 world

Updated on: 31 May,2020 07:46 AM IST  |  Mumbai
Gitanjali Chandrasekharan | gitanjalichandrasekharan@mid-day.com

A world without hugs looks bleak indeed. Psychologists tell us how to cope without the warmth of an embrace

Here's how to manage without hugs in post COVID-19 world

Illustration: Uday Mohite

A short video posted on Twitter shows a grandfather hugging children through a plastic barricade with cuts and gloves for the arms. A world where hugs, pats on the back, pecks on the cheeks and holding hands were common, will now start looking at these simple gestures of love and support with caution, if not downright suspicion. And, perhaps rightly so. The novel Coronavirus has not just stolen time from us, but also our sense of security with fellow humans.


And it's the huggers who will suffer.


Sumit Vaswani, a 34-year-old culture curator, says no work day is complete without hugging colleagues. "Physical touch and hugs are not just friendly social gathering mechanisms, they are a form of energy transmission. They say that a hug has healing powers, I truly believe it does."


Sumit Vaswani
Sumit Vaswani

A 2004 study printed in the Social Psychology of Education, Netherlands, titled Nonverbal encouragement of participation in a course: the effect of touching, mentioned "the fact of a teacher touching a student twice on the arm during an interview following a first examination, results in the student improving his/her later performances, more than those observed in a control group where students were not touched during the interview."

How then will we cope in a world where we can no longer touch as a sign of affection?

Tarana Jain, a clinical psychologist at MindPeers says hugging releases the happy hormone, oxytocin. "It reduces the stress levels and boosts the body's immune system, and we need it even more now. When we don't get to touch or hug people we are close to, it aggravates the stress levels. This situation is called touch deprivation," says Jain. On how to mitigate the effects, she says, what scientists and psychologists have found works is the power of visualisation. "Sit down, close your eyes, and visualise memories of when you have hugged someone close, and feel that warmth. When we recreate the memories, the brain is tricked, leading to the release of oxytocin. This method is used during clinical therapies as well."

Tarana Jain
Tarana Jain

She adds that there's something called tactile stimulation in which your skin gets activated when you touch someone, which also releases oxytocin. Another way of recreating human touch is by petting animals. It's an effective way to decrease cortisol. This, she says, is the basis of animal therapy. "It won't be an exact substitute, but a good substitute."

It's not just touch. With masks on, we are also going to miss the smile on a friend or colleague's face. Or even the random stranger on the train. Jain says, "Facial cues are very important for social feedback. This was initially shown in a research by American psychologist Paul Ekman. Switch to virtual communication via video call, when you will be able to see all their expressions." If facial cues are getting hidden, it's important to improve verbal cues. Make the tone warm, polite and add comforting and encouraging words.

Rutika Likhate
Rutika Likhate

Sanpada-based therapist Rutika Likhate says, a coping mechanism for not being around human touch and reduce the stress levels that may induce, is journalling about your own feelings through the day. This will help you emotionally and teach you to be comfortable with yourself. "When we write, we become aware of our thoughts Certain kinds of thoughts make us feel miserable. Thoughts like 'I can't handle it', 'it's impossible'. These are intense thoughts. Replace 'it's impossible' with 'this situation is uncomfortable, but I can manage it'."

Although you can't see a friend's face, being around them even with social distancing, helps, adds Likhate. "You will still enjoy the comfort of their presence." And hugs needn't die a complete death.

Vaswani hopes it'll still be okay to hug really close friends and family when you meet them, with a mask on.

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