Sensemaking processes during the COVID-19 pandemic for Italian youths experienced lockdown measure

The COVID-19 pandemic brought about disruptive changes in the lives of individuals, shaking the systems of meaning shared in territorial communities. Indeed, in the different phases of the pandemic and particularly in the lockdown condition, the need to construct new meanings emerged in order to understand and deal with this crisis. In order to understand how sensemaking processes were shaped in the face of collective trauma, the results of a work carried out with 36 young Italian adults aged between 21 and 25 years who submitted daily diary entries at two different times, producing 504 texts analysed with the Grounded Theory methodology, will be discussed. 15 categories emerged, grouped into three macro-categories. The central category was sensemaking as a process of adaptation to new circumstances related to the blockage, coping with the emotional, cognitive and activation reactions to such conditions by relying on coping strategies and the redefinition of primary and wider social relationships.