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This study examined the Big Five personality traits as predictors of individual differences and changes in the perceived stressfulness of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany between early April 2020 and early September 2020. This timeframe includes the first national “lockdown,” the period of “easing” of restrictions, and the summer vacation period. Data were collected from n = 588 full-time employees, who provided baseline data on their personality traits in early December 2019, and then later provided data on perceived stressfulness of the COVID-19 pandemic at five time points, spanning six months. Consistent with expectations based on event and transition theories, results showed that, on average, perceived stressfulness declined between early April 2020 and early September 2020. Moreover, this effect was stronger between early April 2020 and early July 2020. Hypotheses based on the differential reactivity model of personality and stress were partially supported. Emotional stability was associated with lower, and extraversion associated with higher, average levels of perceived stressfulness. Finally, extraversion was associated with increases (i.e., positive trajectories) in perceived stressfulness between early April 2020 and early July 2020 and decreases (i.e., negative trajectories) in perceived stressfulness between early July 2020 and early September 2020.
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... 9 The impact of the pandemic on the mental health issues of the general population varies depending on individual differences, including personality traits and level of fear of COVID-19. 4 10 Previous studies have shown that personality traits, such as extraversion and emotional instability, [10][11][12] and the intensity of fear of COVID-19 4 13-15 were associated ...
... 9 The impact of the pandemic on the mental health issues of the general population varies depending on individual differences, including personality traits and level of fear of COVID-19. 4 10 Previous studies have shown that personality traits, such as extraversion and emotional instability, [10][11][12] and the intensity of fear of COVID-19 4 13-15 were associated ...
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Objectives The long-term impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health issues of the general population in Japan is unclear. Thus, we examined the long-term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on fear of COVID-19 and psychological distress and determined their causal relationships among the general population in Japan. Design and setting A longitudinal online survey was conducted by a Japanese online survey company to investigate the items regarding personal demographics, fear of COVID-19 (Japanese version of the fear of COVID-19 scale) and psychological distress (Japanese version of the Kessler 6 scale). Participants The participants were 274 individuals (women=44.2%) with a mean age of 51.6 years (SD=13.6) who responded to the online surveys in September 2020 (Time 1: T1) and January 2023 (Time 2: T2). Results The paired t-test showed that fear of COVID-19 decreased significantly from T1 to T2 (t=2.79, df=273, p<0.01, d=0.16). The χ ² test showed that the proportion of those at high risk for psychological distress remained the same (χ ² =1.33, df=1, n.s.). Furthermore, in a two-panel cross-lagged analysis to determine the causal relationship between fear of COVID-19 and psychological distress, fear of COVID-19 at T1 significantly predicted psychological distress at T2 (β=0.26, p<0.001). Additional multiple regression analyses adjusted for covariates (age, sex, marital status, COVID-19 status, etc) showed that worsening household finances (β=0.11, p<0.05) and avoiding contact with others (β=0.20, p<0.01) were associated with fear of COVID-19 at T2. Conclusions During the long-lasting COVID-19 pandemic, fear of COVID-19 decreased, but psychological distress did not change. In addition, fear of COVID-19 predicted psychological distress and was associated with poorer household finances and avoiding contact with others. Mental health professionals and policymakers should continue to support mental health issues following the long-lasting COVID-19 pandemic through interventions focused on promoting financial support and social interactions to reduce fear of COVID-19.
... Levels of stress due to lack of social contacts might have varied considerably across different periods of the pandemic in which different restrictive measures were taken. It might be expected that adolescents' stress was largest in the early phases of the pandemic when the uncertainty about the course of the pandemic was highest and the lockdown measures limited their face-toface contacts with peers and friends (Zacher & Rudolph, (Zacher & Rudolph, 2021). At the same time, the stress resulting from social restrictions might have increased because of stressor accumulation. ...
... Moreover, people scoring high on extraversion reported a larger rise in depressiveness, partly explained by increased loneliness (Alt et al., 2021) and a less strong positive correlation with positive affect during the pandemic (Anglim & Horwood, 2021). Also in an adult sample, participants scoring higher on extraversion experienced larger increases in stress during the beginning of the pandemic (Zacher & Rudolph, 2021), but not in the later phases of the pandemic (Bellingtier et al., 2021). ...
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Previous studies investigated short-term effects of COVID-19 on families. However, much is unknown about how families with adolescents fared throughout the pandemic, as well as factors that might explain interindividual differences in adjustment. The current study used latent change score models to investigate associations between changes in adolescents’ mental health, parent-adolescent relationship quality, and COVID-19-health-related stress from Fall 2019 to Spring 2021, and whether personality predicted changes in adolescents’ mental health, relationship quality, and stress. Participants were 242 adolescents (Mage = 11.56, SD = 0.44, 50% girls). Parent-adolescent negative interactions decreased from before the pandemic to the first lockdown, and stronger decreases (both in this period and between Fall 2020 and Spring 2021) were associated with simultaneous stronger increases in mental health. From Spring to Fall 2020, decreases in stress were stronger for less extraverted adolescents and were associated with better mental health. More agreeable adolescents reported a stronger decrease in stress between Fall 2020 and Spring 2021. The findings suggest that it is important to consider heterogeneity in designing future intervention and prevention programs. Especially adolescents with existing problems and from multi-problem families might be at risk for adverse consequences during pandemic-like situations.
... Estudios realizados con estudiantes universitarios refieren que estos manifiestan un incremento de estrés, ansiedad, depresión y problemas de sueño derivados del aislamiento por COVID-19, (Ahmeda et al., 2021;Cao et al., 2020;López-Castro et al., 2021), aunado a las preocupaciones relativas al rendimiento académico, a la adaptación del aprendizaje en línea (Kecojevic et al., 2020;Wang et al., 2020), al tiempo que pasan frente a la pantalla (Twenge et al., 2019) y a su éxito académico (Browning et al., 2021) estos aspectos indudablemente impactan en su bienestar biopsicosocial de manera distinta, según los factores de personalidad que caracterizan a cada estudiante (Ahmeda et al., 2021;Zachera y Rudolph, 2020). ...
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Diversos estudios demostraron que la pandemia por COVID-19 impactó negativamente la salud mental de la sociedad y particularmente a los estudiantes de distintos niveles educativos, en ese sentido, este estudio identificó el nivel de bienestar psicológico de los estudiantes mexicanos del Centro Universitario de Ciencias de la Salud (CUCS) de la Universidad de Guadalajara y su relación con la esperanza-desesperanza en el marco del aislamiento social. La población del CUCS es de 13,526 estudiantes de pregrado, se trabajó con una muestra de 412 participantes, quienes respondieron la Escala de Bienestar Psicológico de Ryff y el Test de Esperanza Desesperanza TED-R de Pereyra. Se observó que, a un año del aislamiento social, 31.1% de la muestra presentó un bienestar entre moderado y bajo y el resto un bienestar alto-elevado y que, en cuanto a esperanza, 76.2% presentaron baja y muy baja esperanza. Los resultados muestran que, a menor esperanza, menos bienestar y viceversa.
... This could be explained by the restrictive measures during the pandemic, which may have limited individuals' opportunities to explore new experiences and ideas. Prior studies in the literature [10][11][12] have shown the importance of exploring personality traits in the COVID-19 environment to depict the differences between people during such an outbreak. ...
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This quantitative cross-sectional descriptive research aimed to investigate the relationship between personality traits, emotions, and obesity among Saudi adults during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study recruited 383 participants from Riyadh using non-probability sampling. A validated online survey, including the PANAS-SF and BFI-10 measures, was used and hosted on Qualtrics. Descriptive and multiple regression analyses were performed on the data. The study found that conscientiousness was the highest personality trait among the sample, with an average score of 7.74, while the mean for openness was the lowest. The incidence of obesity was high among participants, with a rate of 29.2 %. Furthermore, there was a significant relationship between negative affect and obesity (p = 0.033). Based on these findings, public health specialists and health promoters should design programs using the socio-ecological model as a guide to address the important factors at every level of the model.
... Therefore, we focus on 33 monthly measurement waves in the current paper, at which measures of both job insecurity and health were collected. Several articles that are based on the same longitudinal dataset, but that address different research questions, have been published (Koziel et al., 2021;Rauvola et al., 2022;Rudolph et al., 2022;, 2024a, 2024bZacher, 2024;Zacher et al., 2021;Zacher & Rudolph, 2021a, 2021b. ...
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This article reports the results of a 33-wave longitudinal study of relations between job insecurity and physical and mental health based on monthly data collected between April 2020 and December 2022 among n = 1,666 employees in Germany. We integrate dynamic theorizing from the transactional stress model and domain-specific theorizing based on stressor creation and perception to frame hypotheses regarding dynamic and reciprocal relations between job insecurity and health over time. We find that lower physical health predicted subsequent increases in job insecurity and higher physical health predicted subsequent decreases in job insecurity. However, job insecurity did not have a significant influence on physical health. Furthermore, higher job insecurity predicted subsequent decreases in mental health, and higher mental health predicted subsequent decreases in job insecurity. This pattern of findings suggests a dynamic and reciprocal within-person process wherein positive deviations from one’s average trajectory of job insecurity are associated with subsequently lower levels of mental health and vice versa. We additionally find evidence for linear trends in these within-person processes themselves, suggesting that the strength of the within-person influence of job insecurity on mental health becomes more strongly negative over time (i.e., a negative amplifying cycle). This research provides practical insights into job insecurity as a health threat and shows how concerns about job loss following deteriorations in physical and mental health serve to further threaten well-being.
... Therefore, we focus on 33 monthly measurement waves in the current paper, at which measures of both job insecurity and health were collected. Several articles that are based on the same longitudinal dataset, but that address different research questions, have been published (Koziel et al., 2021;Rauvola et al., 2022;Rudolph et al., 2022;, 2024a, 2024bZacher, 2024;Zacher et al., 2021;Zacher & Rudolph, 2021a, 2021b. ...
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This article reports the results of a 33-wave longitudinal study of relations between job insecurity and physical and mental health based on monthly data collected between April 2020 and December 2022 among n = 1,666 employees in Germany. We integrate dynamic theorizing from the transactional stress model and domain-specific theorizing based on stressor creation and perception to frame hypotheses regarding dynamic and reciprocal relations between job insecurity and health over time. We find that lower physical health predicted subsequent increases in job insecurity and higher physical health predicted subsequent decreases in job insecurity. However, job insecurity did not have a significant influence on physical health. Furthermore, higher job insecurity predicted subsequent decreases in mental health, and higher mental health predicted subsequent decreases in job insecurity. This pattern of findings suggests a dynamic and reciprocal within-person process wherein positive deviations from one’s average trajectory of job insecurity are associated with subsequently lower levels of mental health and vice versa. We additionally find evidence for linear trends in these within-person processes themselves, suggesting that the strength of the within-person influence of job insecurity on mental health becomes more strongly negative over time (i.e., a negative amplifying cycle). This research provides practical insights into job insecurity as a health threat and shows how concerns about job loss following deteriorations in physical and mental health serve to further threaten wellbeing.
... In particular, studies have considered the different components of well-being. Some studies investigated the emotional dimension, such as negative and positive feelings [2][3][4], states of instability, boredom and loneliness, depression, anxiety, and distress [5]. Others considered the general level of satisfaction [6]. ...
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In February 2020, the Italian government started to adopt measures to contain the spread of COVID-19. This emergency had a strong impact on people's lives and daily activities, negatively affecting their well-being. One of the groups of people that suffered the most from the pandemic emergency and the related isolation was university students. Based on these considerations, this article analyzes the effects of COVID-19 on Italian students' well-being during three periods: the first lockdown (March-April 2020), one year later (March-April 2021), and two years after the lockdowns (March-April 2022). Three samples comprising a total of 765 participants (M = 21 years, SD = 2.87) completed an online self-report questionnaire, which included the I COPPE scale (its short form), a tool that measures the perception of present and future well-being, both as an overall evaluation and its six specific domains: interpersonal, community, occupational, physical, psychological, and economic. The results indicated a general trend in the well-being levels of university students from the beginning of the pandemic to 2022. Compared to 2020, in 2021, there was a sharp decline in well-being, whereas in 2022, there was an increase in well-being levels. Practical implications, limitations, and future recommendations arising from the present study are extensively discussed.
... Personality traits can also predict perceived stress levels during the pandemic (Zacher & Rudolph, 2021). For example, extraversion, neuroticism, and openness are linked to behaviors like hoarding, reflecting COVID-19-related fear (Yoshino et al., 2021). ...
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COVID-19 is a global pandemic that has had significant effects on societies, even though its effects have largely diminished. The psychological state of individuals who cannot leave their homes for long periods during the lockdown practices implemented in many countries is a special situation that needs to be examined. Women and men who stay together at home for long periods may experience conflict with other people. The extent to which this situation is related to the personality traits and gender roles of individuals is a subject of research. For this reason, this study investigates the predictive power of personality traits and gender roles on life satisfaction during the lockdown period due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The study group consists of 571 participants (Female: 327, 42.73%; Male: 244, 57.27%) selected from Türkiye and Georgia, aged between 18 and 50 (Meanage: 21.89, df: 4.09). The results show that adopting feminine and masculine gender roles in both cultures contributes to an increase in individuals' life satisfaction levels, while having neurotic personality traits causes individuals' life satisfaction levels to decrease. However, in Georgia, being extraverted, conscientious, emotionally stable, and exhibiting the characteristics of feminine and masculine gender roles were seen as predictors of life satisfaction, while in Türkiye, being emotionally stable and adopting the feminine gender role were determined as variables that increased life satisfaction. The results obtained were discussed in line with the literature.
... Moreover, those who are very much used to being with others may suffer more from the pandemic. In support of that, a recent study found that higher extraversion was associated with less positive outcomes during the pandemic (Zacher & Rudolph, 2021a). Therefore, we assume: ...
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The exit from the workforce and the transition to retirement often coincides with changes in important aspects of individuals’ daily life and social roles. This can be a demanding experience for some retirees, affecting their mental health. It is thus important to identify relevant psychosocial, health, and financial predictors of adjustment quality. Retiring during the Covid-19 pandemic may have been particularly challenging, as newly retired older adults had fewer opportunities to establish new leisure activities and social relationships due to limits on in-person meeting and travel. In the present study, we compared retirees who retired in or just before the first phase of the pandemic (2019-early 2021, n = 175) with those who retired long before the pandemic (2015-2017, n = 211) in terms of their retirement adjustment quality (reported in late 2020 / early 2021 or 2017, respectively). Retirement adjustment quality was measured by perceived adjustment difficulty and change in life satisfaction across the transition. We further investigated whether pre-retirement social activity, generalized self-efficacy, online activities or disease load were associated with later retirement adjustment in both groups. We found that groups did not differ in their retirement adjustment. In both groups, a higher generalized self-efficacy was associated with better adjustment. Social activities before retirement were only associated with increases in life satisfaction among those retiring before the pandemic. We discuss our findings with respect to the literature on predictors of retirement adjustment, as well as on the effects of the pandemic on psychosocial functioning.
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The present study examined the fear of death among young adults in the wake of the COVID-19. It explored the association between neuroticism and death anxiety during this pandemic crisis, and it also examined the mediating role of perceived stress in this relationship. An online survey of 200 participants, including both students and employed young adults, aged between 18 and 30 years, was conducted. Results showed that neuroticism was positively correlated to death anxiety; however, the relationship was completely mediated by perceived stress. The results and implications are discussed in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Background/Objective The objective of the study was to elucidate the underlying mechanism through which basic personality dimensions predict indicators of psychological functioning during the COVID-19 pandemic, including subjective well-being and perceived stress. As a personality characteristic highly contextualized in stressful circumstances, resilience was expected to have a mediating role in this relationship. Method: A sample of 2,722 Slovene adults, aged from 18 to 82 years filled in the Big Five Inventory, the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, the Perceived Stress Scale, and the Mental Health Continuum. A path analysis with the Bootstrap estimation procedure was performed to evaluate the mediating effect of resilience in the relationship between personality and psychological functioning. Results: Resilience fully or partially mediated the relationships between all the Big Five but extraversion with subjective well-being and stress experienced at the beginning of the COVID-19 outburst. Neuroticism was the strongest predictor of less adaptive psychological functioning both directly and through diminished resilience. Conclusions: Resilience may be a major protective factor required for an adaptive response of an individual in stressful situations such as pandemic and the associated lockdown.
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The present study examined how neuroticism, extraversion, and emotion regulation were related to loneliness and well-being during 6 weeks of major public life restrictions in the Covid-19 pandemic in Switzerland. Cross-sectional results from 466 participants showed that neuroticism and emotion regulation strategies were associated with higher loneliness and lower well-being. However, in contrast to prior research, associations of extraversion with loneliness and well-being were weak and were qualified by interactions with emotion regulation. For introverts, maladaptive cognitive strategies such as rumination or catastrophizing were related to higher levels of loneliness. For extraverts, emotion suppression was related to lower levels of affective well-being. Individuals with low maladaptive regulation reported higher well-being the longer the public life restrictions were in place at the time of study participation. These findings suggest that first, extraversion may lose some of its protective value for loneliness and well-being when opportunities to engage in social activities are limited; second, that loneliness and well-being do not decrease over 6 weeks of public life restrictions; and third, that future studies should further investigate the moderating role of emotion regulation on the link between personality, loneliness, and well-being.
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From the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, psychologists are theorizing that, as compared to introverts, extraverts experience more profound negative social consequences from protective measures (e.g., travel restrictions and bans on public gatherings). As the empirical evidence for this claim is lacking, this study tested the hypothesis that extraversion moderates the relationship between the stringency of COVID-19 protective measures and depressive symptoms. Our results were based on survey data from 93,125 respondents collected in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic (March 20–April 6, 2020) across 47 countries and publicly available data on measure stringency. Findings demonstrate that extraversion moderates the relationship between measure stringency in the early days of the pandemic and depressive symptoms. For introverts, measure stringency has a negative effect on depressive symptoms, while for extraverts, it has a positive, but non-significant effect on depressive symptoms. This study suggests that, although stringent measures generally help people to worry less and feel safer, the lifestyle associated with such measures feels more natural to introverts than to extraverts.
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As the COVID-19 pandemic and interventions intended to minimize its spread continue to impact daily life, personality research may help to address the different ways in which people respond to a major global health crisis. The present study assessed the role of dark personality traits in predicting different responses to the pandemic. A nationally representative sample of 412 Americans completed measures of the Dark Tetrad as well as perceptions of COVID-19 threat, emergency beliefs, and positive and negative affect in response to COVID-19. Narcissism and Machiavellianism predicted greater negative affect and perceptions of threat during the pandemic, while psychopathy predicted positive affect. Conversely, sadism predicted greater positive affect. Dark personality also showed some predictive ability in explaining pandemic-related behaviors (e.g., more frequent cleaning) but not others (e.g., social distancing). Our findings provide evidence for differences in how dark personality traits predict individual responses to global crises.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has led to changes in people’s private and public lives that are unprecedented in modern history. However, little is known about the differential psychological consequences of restrictions that have been imposed to fight the pandemic. In a large and diverse German sample ( N = 1,320), we examined how individual differences in psychological consequences of the pandemic (perceived restrictiveness of government-supported measures, global pandemic-related appraisals, subjective well-being) were associated with a broad set of faceted personality traits (Big Five, Honesty-Humility, Dark Triad). Facets of Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Openness were among the strongest and most important predictors of psychological outcomes, even after controlling for basic sociodemographic variables (gender, age). These findings suggest that psychological consequences of the pandemic depend on personality and thus add to the growing literature on the importance of considering individual differences in crisis situations.
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Large-scale health crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, may evoke negative affective responses, which are linked to psychological maladjustment and psychopathology. Here, we shed light on the role of the personality trait neuroticism in predicting who experiences negative affective responses. In a large-scale experience-sampling study (N = 1,609; 38,120 momentary reports), we showed that individuals high in neuroticism experienced more negative affect and higher affective variability in their daily lives. Individuals high in neuroticism also (a) paid more attention to COVID-19-related information and worried more about the consequences of the pandemic (crisis preoccupation), and (b) experienced more negative affect during this preoccupation (affective reactivity). These findings offer new insights into the consequences and dynamics of neuroticism in extreme environmental contexts.
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