Agoraphobia and the COVID-19 Pandemic

When the Covid-19 virus began to spread worldwide in the spring of 2020, life across the globe changed rapidly. Government restrictions required people to move into prolonged social isolation and the resulting impact of this isolation on mental health has been profound (Brooks et al., 2020). Initial research has begun to be conducted to understand the scope of how social isolation and the pandemic have influenced people’s psychological well-being. Thus far there has been a marked increase in depression and anxiety disorders (Eyice Karabacak et al., 2021). Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder that is characterized by fear and avoidance of certain settings. Undoubtedly, fear and avoidance of certain settings during the pandemic cannot be considered abnormal behavior as it is in line with a normative response to such a threatening phenomenon. This study investigates how normative avoidance of certain settings during the pandemic may have now evolved into fear of the settings themselves. In particular, it tested if the start of the pandemic is associated with the prevalence rate of Agoraphobia. This was done via a retrospective study that uses self-report data to examine whether participants presented symptoms of Agoraphobia prior to the start of the pandemic and if they currently exhibit symptoms of Agoraphobia. In addition to the study, the website designed to host this study also provided mental health resources to participants, in light of the documented increase in mental illness since the start of the pandemic (Brooks et al., 2020).