Influence of Daily Coping on Psychological Stress: A Multilevel Modeling Approach

Abstract

The current study examined the association between approach and avoidance coping strategies and psychological stress during the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Participants were 62 adults who were recruited from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Data collection lasted for 29 d in May 2020. Multilevel modeling revealed no significant association between approach coping strategies and psychological stress among individuals, and engaging in approach coping more than the usual days was also not associated with lower stress. Regarding avoidance coping strategies, they were positively associated with psychological stress among individuals, and when individuals engaged in avoidance coping more than usual, those individuals were more likely to experience psychological stress. Interestingly, the strength of the association between approach coping strategies and psychological stress was dependent on the levels of psychological stress, where the strength became weaker as the level of stress increased. Similarly, the strength of the association between avoidance coping and stress was also dependent on stress at the beginning of the study, where the strength of the association became stronger as the level of stress increased. Current results raise the importance of being mindful of an individual’s psychological stress as the effectiveness of coping strategies may differ based on one’s level of stress.