Coronavirus Disease Stress Among Italian Healthcare Workers: The Role of Coping Humor

Abstract

The study aimed to understand how coping strategies in general and humor-based coping strategies in particular modulate the perception of pandemic-related stress in a sample of Italian healthcare workers during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Italy. A total of 625 healthcare workers anonymously and voluntarily completed a 10-min questionnaire, which included psychometrically valid measurements preceded by a set of questions aimed at determining workers’ exposure to COVID-19. The Perceived Stress Scale was used to measure healthcare workers’ stress levels, and the Brief COPE Scale and Coping Humor Scale were used to assess participants’ avoidant or approach coping style and verify the degree to which they relied on humor to cope with stress. The results show that (1) levels of perceived stress were higher in healthcare workers who were more exposed to COVID-19 (i.e., who came into contact with COVID-19 patients or worked in wards dedicated to COVID-19) in comparison to less-exposed workers; (2) participants who reported a higher use of avoidant coping strategies perceived the situation as more stressful than those who used them less; and (3) healthcare workers who reported higher use of humor-based coping strategies perceived the situation as less stressful in comparison with those who reported less use of coping humor. Such findings expanded other research studies by including coping humor as a potential factor to mitigate the perceived stress related to COVID-19. The paper concludes with a discussion of implications for future research and limitations of the study.

Associations between Personality Traits, Intolerance of Uncertainty, Coping Strategies, and Stress in Italian Frontline and Non-Frontline HCWs during the COVID-19 Pandemic—A Multi-Group Path-Analysis

“…As for the association between coping strategies and perceived stress, in both groups, resorting to emotion-focused coping strategies (acceptance, seeking emotional support, humor, positive reframing, religion) was negatively related to perceived stress, whereas the dysfunctional one was positively linked to stress. The first association we identified, according to which emotion-focused coping strategies are linked to lower level of perceived stress, thus functioning as a protective factor against negative psychological outcomes, is consistent with the results of many other studies on the general population during COVID-19 [106], as well as on HCWs before COVID-19 [107][108][109] and during it [110,111]. Similarly, also the second association we identified, according to which, on the contrary, dysfunctional coping strategies (behavioral disengagement, denial, self-blame, self-distraction, substance use) are linked to higher levels of perceived stress, is consistent with the results of many other studies [79,100,110], as well as in line with our expectations.…”

Stress and Coping Strategies among Nursing Students in Clinical Practice during COVID-19

“…While multiple studies have reported on the psychological well-being of healthcare workers during COVID-19 [ 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 ], our study is one of the first to examine the influence of the pandemic by controlling for before the pandemic in nursing students in Saudi Arabia. Data collection occurred during the first wave of the pandemic in the country.…”

Care for Joy: Evaluation of a Humor Intervention and Its Effects on Stress, Flow Experience, Work Enjoyment, and Meaningfulness of Work

“…This was shown in a qualitative study in which nurses in training used humor as a coping strategy to cope with stressful personenvironment relations (e.g., dealing with patients who violate social norms) and to achieve positive affect as an outcome (61). Even in extraordinary times such as the COVID-19 pandemic, humor has been shown to be an effective coping strategy (62) and this was also found for nurses (63,64). People with a greater sense of humor can manage stress more effectively (16).…”