The Effect of COVID-19 on Academic Social Life in Riyadh with a Focus on the Outdoor Environment

Abstract

On 18 March 2020, the World Health Organization announced that the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic had reached global pandemic status. The Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia implemented a COVID-19 lockdown that lasted for four months. After the period of restrictions ended, people were supposed to return to their normal social lives; however, the lockdown had a psychological impact on people without them being aware of it. This research aimed to study the effect of COVID-19 on social life, mainly focusing on six public activities: visiting shopping malls, mosques, open spaces, interior space, psychological effect, and occupational aspects. The Method survey was distributed during lockdown including the six focus areas and collected using Google Forms. Also, a computer program simulation (ENVI-MET) was used to study and develop an outdoor environment. The research focuses on the outdoor environment to find solutions on a sample used Al Rouda Park in Riyadh. The results demonstrated that people are slowly returning to their social lives during the COVID-19 pandemic by steadily visiting shopping malls, mosques, and open spaces and half of respondents stay at home fearing COVID-19. The research concluded that people should apply health procedures during ongoing time in studied locations and should manage the elaborated psychological effects.