Emotional Well-Being Under Conditions of Lockdown: An Experience Sampling Study in Austria During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Stieger, Stefan; Lewetz, David; Swami, Viren

doi:10.1007/s10902-020-00337-2

Cited by 117 publications

(107 citation statements)

References 77 publications

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“…A long-term study found a reduction or return to normal levels of anxiety among people in isolation during MERS (Jeong et al, 2016). Studies also have shown reductions in worry (Bendau et al, 2020;Varga et al, 2021) and a slight increase in happiness during the late phase of the COVID-19 lockdown in April 2020 (Stieger et al, 2021). Similarly, a recent study (Bendau et al, 2021) found that COVID-19-related fear, anxiety, and depressive symptoms decreased on average over time (March to June), again showing that most people grow accustomed to challenging new situation over time.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Identifying Resilience Factors of Distress and Paranoia During the COVID-19 Outbreak in Five Countries

et al. 2021

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The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic outbreak has affected all countries with more than 100 million confirmed cases and over 2.1 million casualties by the end of January 2021 worldwide. A prolonged pandemic can harm global levels of optimism, regularity, and sense of meaning and belonging, yielding adverse effects on individuals' mental health as represented by worry, paranoia, and distress. Here we studied resilience, a successful adaptation despite risk and adversity, in five countries: Brazil, Colombia, Germany, Israel, and Norway. In April 2020, over 2,500 participants were recruited for an observational study measuring protective and obstructive factors for distress and paranoia. More than 800 of these participants also completed a follow-up study in July. We found that thriving, keeping a regular schedule, engaging in physical exercise and less procrastination served as factors protecting against distress and paranoia. Risk factors were financial worries and a negative mindset, e.g., feeling a lack of control. Longitudinally, we found no increase in distress or paranoia despite an increase in expectation of how long the outbreak and the restrictions will last, suggesting respondents engaged in healthy coping and adapting their lives to the new circumstances. Altogether, our data suggest that humans adapt even to prolonged stressful events. Our data further highlight several protective factors that policymakers should leverage when considering stress-reducing policies.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Identifying Resilience Factors of Distress and Paranoia During the COVID-19 Outbreak in Five Countries

et al. 2021

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“…Although technological tools (e.g., Zoom, FaceTime) have made it possible to remain in contact with close friends and family members at the outset of the pandemic, emerging evidence suggests that virtual connection is not as conducive as face-to-face contact for discussing personal problems. For instance, some evidence suggests that virtual screen time at this initial stage of the pandemic was associated with lower mental well-being (Ellis, Dumas, and Forbes 2020;Stieger, Lewetz, and Swami 2021). In addition, past research on support crisis situations shows that face-to-face contact, but not virtual interaction, was associated with improved well-being (Hawdon and Ryan 2012).…”

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confidence: 99%

Socially Distant? Social Network Confidants, Loneliness, and Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic

2021

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In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many nations around the world instituted strict social distancing measures. Although necessary to deter the spread of the virus, these measures may also have had adverse health repercussions by increasing social isolation. Using a national longitudinal study from Canada, in which respondents were surveyed in March 2020 at the beginning of stay-at-home orders and again two months later in May, we show that, at baseline, loneliness was inversely associated with perceptions of self-rated health, and there was a beneficial indirect association between respondents’ number of social network confidants and perceived health through lower levels of loneliness. Between March and May, social network confidants decreased and loneliness increased; these changes were independent of each other and contributed to declines in self-rated health. Greater loneliness at baseline was also associated with declines in self-rated health. Our observations suggest that social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic impaired social connectedness, thereby resulting in declines in perceptions of health. We conclude by discussing several policy-related implications of our findings.

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“…As such, the ESM is uniquely suited to gain highly ecologically valid insights into adolescents' day-to-day social lives. During the pandemic, researchers have used ESM to reveal decreases in loneliness throughout the initial stages of the pandemic (Fried et al, 2020;Stieger et al, 2021). However, to gain insight into the impact of the pandemic on social interactions, we must also test changes in day-to-day social interactions from before to during the pandemic -as doing so allows us to make inferences about the actual effects of the pandemic on social behaviors.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, it is largely unknown to what extent the COVID-19 pandemic has boosted digital communication, and to what extent online social interactions have formed worthwhile alternatives to face-toface contact. Although some initial findings in adults suggest a small negative association between screen time and momentary well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic (Stieger et al, 2021), it has been argued that the concept of screen time is too vague, and it may be more worthwhile to move beyond assessing screen-time effects, to focus more on what digital communication tools are used for -for example, for socializing (Orben, 2020;Orben & Przybylski, 2019).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

COVID-19-related changes in adolescents' daily-life social interactions and psychopathology symptoms

Achterhof¹,

Myin-Germeys²,

Bamps³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Early findings on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on adolescents, suggest that – despite being at the lowest physical health risk – both their mental health and day-to-day social lives are strongly affected. In this longitudinal study, we assessed changes in adolescent psychopathology symptoms, the quality and quantity of daily-life social interactions, and the relationship between social interactions and psychopathology symptoms before and during the pandemic.A sample of n=173 Flemish adolescents (mean age=16.0 at latest measurement; 89% girls) from the SIGMA cohort was tested between January 2018 - June 2019; and between April 27th - May 10th 2020. Subclinical psychopathology was assessed using the Brief Symptom Inventory-53; daily social interactions were assessed in six-day experience sampling periods with ten daily questionnaires.Multilevel linear and logistic regression analyses indicated lower general psychopathology and anxiety symptoms, beyond age effects; fewer face-to-face social interactions, more online social interactions; and higher-quality face-to-face interactions during the pandemic than before. Negative associations between psychopathology and the quality of face-to-face peer and family interactions were stronger during the pandemic than pre-pandemic.The observed decrease and stability in psychopathology symptoms is surprising and potentially reflects resilience. Although digital communication may buffer much of the quarantine-induced distress, the current results imply that high-quality face-to-face interactions with family and peers may have been more powerful in keeping adolescents resilient. As restrictions are lifted and adolescents’ daily lives and social worlds change, it is crucial to learn more about the longer-term effects of the experienced social deprivation.

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Emotional Well-Being Under Conditions of Lockdown: An Experience Sampling Study in Austria During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Cited by 117 publications

References 77 publications

Identifying Resilience Factors of Distress and Paranoia During the COVID-19 Outbreak in Five Countries

Identifying Resilience Factors of Distress and Paranoia During the COVID-19 Outbreak in Five Countries

Socially Distant? Social Network Confidants, Loneliness, and Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic

COVID-19-related changes in adolescents' daily-life social interactions and psychopathology symptoms

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