I can completely agree with this. I've had a lot of jobs, and I had one in a big (but crammed) open office space where I sat next to people in roles (e.g. HR) that required them to talk all day. The constant noise, movement, and loss of privacy just sucked out all my energy. Going home after work did nothing to refresh me because it was like recharging a battery that was at -80% to -60%. Ironically, it was the highest paying job I've ever had and also the one where I got the least accomplished in the time I was there due to that office.
Mind you, this was in NYC. Going outside into the chaos of NYC noise and traffic felt relaxing compared to that office.
>As a positive, if I were 20 years older I'd probably have started working in cubicles, which have all the negatives of an open office but without any natural sunlight.
I don't think cubicles have all the negatives of open offices. At one job I had a small cubicles where the dividers were about 5 feet high. Despite all the cubicles around me being people from tech support (who were on the phone all day), I just had a much greater sense of isolation and privacy. I was very productive in that environment. The tech support people were enterprise support people though, so their conversations had lots of pauses while somebody dug through log files, made config changes, etc. Might have been very different if they were support regular consumers.
I've seen cubicles where the dividers are chest/shoulder height. Those cubicles might as well be an open office, but at least you have some allocation of personal space on your desk.