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Covid lockdowns may have caused Britons to think less about their future and other people, scientists say.
Academics found 'significant changes' in people's daily thought patterns, which was linked to the drastic change in routine.
Draconian stay-at-home measures adopted to thwart the virus forced millions to stay inside, only leaving their home to exercise and shop for food.
It also effectively cut their socialising, leading to isolation and drove up anxiety and depression levels.
The new research, by York University, is the first to document the 'systemic changes' that occurred during the unprecedented restrictions.
Scientists sent five texts a day for a week to 113 people before the pandemic struck, asking them about what they were thinking.
The same texts were sent to a similar group of 82 people during the first lockdown, which came into force on March 23.
Messages were studied to identify common patterns of thought under the different conditions, as well as among younger and older groups.
The graph compares the prevalence of thoughts pre-lockdown (white) and during the first lockdown (grey), across younger people (left) and older people (right). The words on the left represent each thought pattern. It shows the most notable changes in how people think were recorded in a decline in thoughts about the future (top line) and thinking about others (third line)
Experts chose five common patterns of thought including future-directed problem solving and social cognition.
People thought less about the future under strict Covid restrictions, unless they were doing more work, researchers found.
