The role of passion for studies on academic procrastination and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic

Social Psychology of Education - Procrastination is a maladaptive behaviour that students often experience in academic activities and can result in negative consequences to mental health. The...     

The relationship between anxiety sensitivity and fear of pain in healthy adolescents

The present study investigated the relationship between anxiety sensitivity and fear of pain in a large group of healthy adolescents (N=200). Participants completed the childhood anxiety sensitivity index for children-revised, a questionnaire measuring four specific domains of anxiety sensitivity: fear of cardiovascular symptoms, fear of respiratory symptoms, fear of cognitive dyscontrol, and fear of publicly observable anxiety symptoms, and a simplified version of the pain anxiety symptoms scale, a self-report instrument assessing pain-related anxiety and avoidance (i.e. fear of pain). In line with previous research in adult populations, it was found that anxiety sensitivity is substantially and positively related to fear of pain. Even when controlling for other potential predictors of fear of pain (i.e. pain symptoms, other somatization symptoms, trait anxiety, and panic disorder symptoms), anxiety sensitivity appeared to declare a unique proportion of the variance in pain anxiety symptoms.     

The role of mindfulness and compassion in early adults' subsequent mental health,coping and compliance with health guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic: A prospective longitudinal study

The present study explored prospective links between trait mindfulness and compassion on subsequent coping and compliance with Centers for Disease Control (CDC) guidelines and indirect effects via well-being and internalized distress during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study included N = 736 US college students who participated in a three-wave longitudinal study across a single academic year. The first two assessment waves took place in 2018 and 2019, respectively, while the third wave took place in May 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants completed self-report measures of trait mindfulness, compassion, well-being, internalized distress, coping, and compliance with CDC health guidelines. Results of a series of autoregressive, cross-lagged panel models revealed that trait mindfulness was associated with better coping via indirect effects of greater well-being and lower internalized distress. Greater compassion was linked with greater adherence to CDC guidelines. Findings suggest that trait mindfulness and compassion may play a role in college students' coping and compliance during the pandemic.     

The relationship between mental vitality and cardiovascular health

Past measurement of vitality has included both emotional and physical components. Since aspects of physical vitality such as fatigue can be indicative of physical illness, the usefulness of existing measures of vitality to predict health is limited. This research was designed to examine the psychometric properties of a new Mental Vitality Scale and to test its associations with measures of cardiovascular health over the course of 2 years. The measure of mental vitality was administered in a two-part study using three different samples. In part 1, the reliability and validity of the scale was assessed with a student and a clinic sample. In part 2, medical data on mental and physical health were abstracted over a two-year period from 1041 patient records from a multi-specialty medical practice, and mental vitality assessed through a mailed questionnaire. The findings indicate that the Mental Vitality Scale is a valid and reliable questionnaire for measuring this construct. Mental vitality was also associated with reduced odds of several cardiovascular outcomes and prospective analyses suggest that mental vitality may serve a protective function in the development of cardiovascular disease. The results lend support for the importance of mental vitality as a construct that may be relevant for considering resilience in relation to cardiovascular disease.     

The link between involuntary non-regular employment and poor mental health: A cross-sectional study of Japanese workers

Involuntary non-regular employment is a severe inequity problem worldwide, and it may significantly affect the mental health of employees. The present study aimed to examine the relationship between employment type and mental health. Additionally, the characteristics of involuntary non-regularly employed workers were explored. An online-based cross-sectional study was conducted in Japan, and 1566 participants were included in the data analysis. The eligible participants were divided into four categories: regularly employed (n = 1092), voluntary (n = 134), average (n = 233) and involuntary (n = 107) non-regularly employed individuals, respectively. Involuntary non-regular employment was associated with greater lack of vigour, anger-irritability, fatigue, anxiety, and depression. It was higher among women, those who were single or had no childcare, and those who had lower personal income or shorter working hours, or who tended not to practice relaxation activities. Lower personal income was associated with a risk of anxiety and depressive symptoms. Those individuals experiencing involuntary non-regular employment had a higher risk of poor mental health; subgroup analysis showed that this was particularly true among men. Both encouragement of employment stability via policy reform and workplace mental health support for involuntary non-regularly employed individuals are urgent health concerns.     

A healthy dose of trust: The relationship between interpersonal trust and health

The positive effects of trust are manifold. Recent research has shown that trust levels may even influence physical health. The current work explores this issue and aims to shed light on the mechanisms underlying the relationship between trust and health in a 5‐wave longitudinal data set. Results showed that trust was positively related to physical health: Participants report fewer health problems when they trust their partner more, replicating earlier findings. More importantly, symptoms of anxiety and depression mediate the effect of trust on self‐reported health. Finally, results of residual lagged analyses show that earlier levels of trust predict later symptoms of anxiety and depression symptoms, in turn predicting changes in physical health symptoms over time.     

Testing the bidirectional relationship between belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories and psychological distress: A five-wave longitudinal study

Previous studies have primarily focused on understanding why people believe conspiracy theories, especially during societal crises (e.g., the COVID-19 pandemic). The investigation of how such conspiracy beliefs would influence people's mental well-being has just begun recently. The present research aims to address this crucial question by testing the relationships between psychological distress and COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs with a five-wave longitudinal study. On the one hand, COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs could be more appealing to people with heightened distress, as these theories apparently help people to make sense of the uncertainty and life-threatening disease outbreak. On the other hand, conspiracy theories could be a source of existential threat and thus, would induce rather than reduce psychological distress. We tested these possibilities empirically by a series of cross-lagged model analyses. Using the random intercept cross-lagged panel model analysis, we only found a between-person association but not a cross-lagged within-person relationship between the two. COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs was predicted by being more politically conservative. These findings were further corroborated by the supplementary latent growth curve analyses. Overall, our findings suggest that conspiracy beliefs may not induce or reduce psychological distress in the context of COVID-19.     

The relationship between ethnicity,Christian orthodoxy,and mental health

Although researchers have noted differences in the role of religiosity in the lives of people from different ethnic backgrounds, the components of religion's influence (i.e., membership and orthodoxy) on mental health have not been previously examined. In the current study, Christian participants’ Christian Orthodox Scale (COS) scores were used to predict scores on mental health. As hypothesized, African Americans with higher COS scores exhibited fewer mental-health problems than did all ethnicities studied with lower COS scores. Implications and future directions for understanding the cultural influence of religion on African Americans are discussed.     

群体认同与个体心理健康的关系:调节变量与作用机制

近年来,群体认同与个体心理健康的关系得到了研究者的关注。本研究通过对相关文献的梳理与归纳发现:民族、国家、学校、家庭等不同种类群体的认同,群体认同数量与个体心理健康的关系显著;群体认同与个体心理健康之间的关系受群体认同动机和个体对群体评价的调节,并依赖于自尊、社会支持、控制知觉、归因方式等因素的中介;未来应利用多种方法继续研究群体认同与个体心理健康关系的调节变量与作用机制。     

Family mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic: Changes in parent-adolescent internalizing symptoms in the United States

The current paper examined the temporal linkage of internalizing symptoms among parent-adolescent dyads during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, and whether COVID-19-related concerns were associated with parent-adolescent linkage of symptoms. Using a 5-week survey-based study, parent-adolescent dyads filled out weekly surveys measuring COVID-19 concerns and internalizing symptoms. Parent and adolescent depressive symptoms did not change over time; however, adolescents experienced decreases in anxiety. Parent-adolescent dyads exhibited linkage in depressive symptoms but not anxiety symptoms. However, linkage in anxiety symptoms varied by parent's COVID-related stress. Study findings provide insight into how COVID-19 disruptions impacted family well-being during adolescence.     

The role of the clergyman in mental health

Pastoral Psychology -     

The role of the infant mental health therapist in the framework of preventive mental health

The role of the infant mental health therapist is differentiated from that of other infant interventionists as being a secondary prevention treatment approach employing the techniques of long-term, insight-oriented psychotherapy. Such an approach encourages the caregiver to recall his or her own childhood experiences and conflicts to gain an understanding of feelings directed at his or her own baby. The prevention models of Caplan are considered as is the development of the work of Fraiberg and her colleagues.     

Religiousness on mental health in older adults: the mediating role of social support and healthy behaviours

The positive association between religiousness and mental health among the faithful is well-established; here, social support (SS) and healthy behaviours (HB) are investigated as mechanisms underlying the benefits of faith on depression and anxiety in a survey sample of 97 religious older adults aged 62–96 (M_age?=?79). Initial regression models revealed a significant direct effect (higher religiousness?=?less depression and less anxiety). For depressive symptoms, both individual mediators rendered the effect of religiousness non-significant, with HB explaining more variance (36% vs. 27%); in the combined model, both demonstrated independent, additive effects (SS?=??.18, p?=?.006; HB?=??.34, p?p?=?.005). The results help inform those working with religious older adults facing depression and anxiety by highlighting key aspect(s) of the person’s faith experience that will be most effective in helping to improve his or her mental health.     

The relationship between Quest religious orientation,forgiveness, and mental health

Little is known about how religious orientation, specifically Quest, relates to forgiveness. In addition, research on the relationship between Quest and psychological distress has yielded conflicting findings, possibly because previous studies have conceptualised Quest as a unidimensional construct. This study investigated how Quest and its recently recognised dimensions related to forgiveness and psychological distress. Participants (N?=?242) were undergraduates from a Midwestern Catholic university. They completed measures of Quest, forgiveness, and psychological distress. Results suggested that certain dimensions of Quest were better predictors of forgiveness (e.g., Tentativeness, Exploration, and Moralistic Interpretation) and distress (e.g., Change, Religious Angst, and Existential Motives). Importantly, results revealed that the same dimensions that were positively related to distress were negatively related to forgiveness. Further, the relationship between Quest and forgiveness was moderated by the perceived tolerance/open-mindedness level of the offender; it seems that individuals with a questing nature are less forgiving when the offender is perceived as less tolerant.     

Stressors, quality of the child-caregiver relationship, and children's mental health problems after parental death: the mediating role of self-system beliefs

Investigated whether three self-system beliefs, fear of abandonment, coping efficacy, and self-esteem, mediated the relations of stressors and caregiver-child relationship quality with concurrent and prospective internalizing and externalizing problems in a sample of children who had experienced parental death in the previous 2.5 years. The cross-sectional sample consisted of 340 children ages 7-16 and their surviving parent/current caregiver; the longitudinal analyses employed a subset of this sample that consisted of 100 children and their parents/caregivers who were assessed at three time points. A multirater, multimethod measure of caregiver-child relationship quality and a multirater measure of children's mental health problems were used. The cross-sectional model supported a mediational relation for fear of abandonment, coping efficacy, and self-esteem. The three-wave longitudinal model showed that fear of abandonment at Time 2 mediated the relation between stressors at Time 1 and internalizing and externalizing problems at Time 3. Implications of these findings for understanding the development of mental health problems in parentally bereaved children and designing interventions for this at-risk group are discussed.     

The longitudinal relationship between fear of positive evaluation and fear of negative evaluation

Available research suggests that fear of negative evaluation and fear of positive evaluation are related but distinct constructs that each contribute to social anxiety, implying a need to focus on these fears in treatment. Yet, this research is almost entirely based on cross-sectional data. We examined the longitudinal relationship between fears of positive and negative evaluation over three time points in a sample of undergraduate students. We tested competing models consistent with two basic positions regarding these fears: (1) that fear of positive evaluation only appears to affect social anxiety because it arises from the same, single underlying trait as fear of negative evaluation, and (2) fears of positive and negative evaluation are correlated, but clearly distinct, constructs. The best-fitting model was an autoregressive latent-trajectory model in which each type of fear had a separate trait-like component. The correlation between these trait-like components appeared to fully account for the relationships between these constructs over time. This investigation adds to the evidence in support of the second position described above: fear of positive evaluation is best interpreted as a separate construct from fear of negative evaluation.     

The association between social isolation,loneliness and psychological problems in young adults: A study during the acute phase of COVID-19 in Italy

During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments had to impose social isolation measures to safeguard the citizens' health. However, this could have affected psychological problems. The aim of the present study was to investigate the psychological effects associated with social and emotional isolation during the acute phase of the COVID-19 in Italy. To this purpose, the degree of social isolation and loneliness and the presence of psychological problems (externalising and internalising) were investigated online in a sample of 395 young adults (18–30 years; 57% women). Results confirmed the relevant association between social isolation, loneliness and psychological problems, in both internalising and externalising dimensions. Particularly, loneliness showed the strongest association. Moreover, consistently with surveys conducted during the COVID-19-era, data highlighted that men were more vulnerable to social isolation and loneliness than women. These results underline the need for adequate interpersonal support during moments of isolation to prevent negative effects on psychological problems.