Psychological Stress Reactions Research Articles

Examining how different social account timings influence stress resolution in the aftermath of a psychological contract breach

A great deal of empirical research on the consequences of a psychological contract breach (PCB) has overlooked the role of time in understanding individuals’ reactions to a PCB. Moreover, psychological contract research primarily focuses on how employees react to perceptions of a PCB, while questions regarding how the organization’s responsiveness (i.e., social account) might impact these reactions remain unanswered. We aimed to enhance the understanding of stress reactions and recovery that are triggered by PCB perceptions and stimulate empirical research that treats psychological contracts as a dynamic phenomenon. Drawing on the conservation of resources theory, we investigated how social account delivery timing—and its subjective experience—influences individuals’ stress resolution processes in the aftermath of a PCB. To this end, we used an experimental design and assessed participants’ physiological (i.e., heart rate) and psychological (i.e., self-report) stress reactions after inducing a breach. Our results underscore that a PCB is experienced as a stressful event. In addition, we find that social account timing influences heart rate recovery following a PCB. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings and offer recommendations for practitioners.

Hubungan Dukungan Keluarga Dengan Tingkat Kecemasan Pada Persalinan Normal Masa Pandemi COVID-19 Di RSKD Ibu Dan Anak Pertiwi Kota Makassar

Mothers who undergo normal delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic can experience severe anxiety because the Corona Virus Disease-19 virus can also cause severe respiratory infections, such as lung infections (pneumonia). This virus can attack anyone, including pregnant women and babies is a potential or actual threat to a person's integrity that can evoke physiological and psychological stress reactions. The purpose of this study was to determine connetion between family support and anxiety levels during normal delivery on the COVID-19 pandemic at the Mother and Child Hospital Mother and Child Makassar..
 Methods: The research design used wasresearch descriptive correlational through aapproach the cross-sectional. number of respondents in this study was 35 respondents with a sample of 35 respondents and the sampling technique used in this study was total sampling by taking all samples in the population. This research was conducted on 16 oktober - 2 November 2021. The instrument used was a questionnaire sheet distributed to respondents
 Results: The results of this study were processed using SPPSS 22. The results of the analysis with somers'd test obtained p value = 0.000 < value a=0.05. From this analysis, it can be interpreted that Ha is accepted and Ho is rejected, meaning that there is a connetion between family support and anxiety levels in normal delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic.
 Conclusion: For this reason, it is important to provide counseling and motivation to patients with normal delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic in increasing family support and decreasing anxiety in dealing with childbirth

Mental burden among Chinese undergraduate medical students: A prospective longitudinal study before, during, and after the COVID-19 outbreak.

BackgroundIncreasing evidence indicated a clear association between COVID-19 pandemic and mental health. This study aimed to assess the dynamic change of mental burden during and after the COVID-19 outbreak and related predictive factors among Chinese undergraduate medical students.MethodsThis longitudinal survey was conducted among Chinese undergraduate medical students before, during, and after the COVID-19 outbreak. We focused on COVID-19 related mental burdens including psychological distress, stress reaction, and insomnia symptoms, and defined the sum score of the three specific mental burden indexes as the overall mental burden index. The prevalence of specific and overall mental burdens and their changing patterns at two phases of the pandemic (during vs. after the COVID-19 outbreak) were measured. In addition, multinomial logistic regressions were used to assess the associations between the psychosocial status before the pandemic and specific and overall mental burden changing patterns.ResultsOur findings showed that the prevalence of overall mental burden increased (from 27.46 to 37.28%) after the COVID-19 outbreak among the 863 Chinese undergraduate medical students who participated in the surveys at baseline, during, and after the COVID-19 outbreak. Specifically, the prevalence of stress reaction symptoms decreased (from 10.90 to 3.60%), while the rates of psychological distress (from 28.06 to 37.95%) and insomnia symptoms (from 12.54 to 20.71%) increased. Participants, with obsessive-compulsive symptoms, somatic symptoms, internet addiction, childhood adversity, stressful life events, and being neurotic were found to have a higher risk of developing mental burden in at least one survey (during or after the COVID-19 outbreak). Healthy family function and being extravert were found to positively impact mental burden.ConclusionPsychological distress, stress reaction and insomnia symptoms have been prevalent among Chinese undergraduate medical students during the COVID-19 outbreak, and the prevalence of overall mental burden increased after the COVID-19 outbreak. Some students, especially those with the risk factors noted above, exhibited persistent or progression symptoms. Continued mental health care was in demand for them even after the COVID-19 outbreak.

Psychosocial stress induction in vivo vs. in virtuo and the influence of a health app on the acute stress reaction in youths: a study protocol for a randomized controlled trial

BackgroundAcute and everyday stress is substantial for the development of mental and physical diseases, therefore it is crucial to get a better understanding of its pathogenesis. Different methods (e.g., Ambulatory Assessment) and stress reactivity paradigms (e.g., Trier Social Stress Test / TSST) in laboratory settings are often used to investigate basic mechanisms of this process. Due to the technological progress of the last years and especially due to children and adolescents growing up with it, the application of these developments in clinical research is reasonable. The aim of this project is to successfully transfer the TSST for children and adolescents into the virtual world, which will be compared to a real TSST situation. Physiological and psychological stress reactions will be analyzed in order to assess similarities and differences. Moreover, it will be investigated whether a Heart Coherence Exercise (HCE) has a stronger influence on coping with acute stress compared to Natural Relaxation (NR).MethodsThis single-center experimental study will examine acute and everyday stress and coping processes in eighty-four healthy children and adolescents between the ages of 11 and 17. For everyday stress, different parameters (e.g., hormonal profiles and mood ratings) as well as a history of stressful life events and utilized coping methods will be recorded and a relaxation exercise will be practiced on a smartphone over 2 days. Regarding the acute stress reaction, the participants will be confronted either with the virtual or the real version of the TSST, followed by the trained relaxation exercise (HCE vs. NR). Physiological (e.g., cortisol and heart rate) and psychological stress markers (e.g., mood and gaze behavior) will be recorded continuously.DiscussionStudies are sparse using a virtual version of the TSST in children and adolescents. A successful virtual TSST would constitute an economical variant, which would also make it easier to administer it in clinical or population-based samples. Effective ambulatory relaxation exercises would be a useful addition to clinical treatment approaches.Trial registrationThe study is registered in the German Clinical Trials Register since 10 August 2020 (DRKS00022063).

Relationship between psychological stress and ghrelin concentrations in pregnant women with overweight or obesity

Exposure to, perception of, and response to stress have all been shown to influence appetite and dietary behaviors in non-pregnancy human and animal studies, mediated in part by the appetite stimulating hormone ghrelin. Yet, the impact of prenatal stress on biological pathways associated with appetite in the context of pregnancy is not well understood. The objective of this study was to assess the relationship between these layered dimensions of stress with fasting and postprandial plasma ghrelin concentrations among Hispanic pregnant women with overweight or obesity, a population known to experience heightened levels of stress. Thirty-three non-diabetic Hispanic women with pre-pregnancy body mass index of 25.0–34.9 kg/m2 participated in a crossover study at 28–32 weeks’ gestation. At each visit, participants provided fasting blood and saliva samples, consumed a standardized mixed-meal, and completed a 15-minute task: friendly conversation (control) or the Trier Social Stress Test (experimental stress exposure). Six timed blood and saliva samples were collected up to 2 h from baseline and assayed for ghrelin and cortisol, respectively, and area-under-the-curve (AUC) values were computed. Day-to-day stress levels were assessed by the Perceived Stress Scale. Physiological and psychological stress reactivity was determined by cortisol AUC and change in self-reported affect state, respectively, during the experimental stress visit. Maternal perceived stress was positively associated with ghrelin concentrations in the fasted (β = 0.06, p = 0.02) and postprandial state (β = 0.05, p = 0.02). Mean ghrelin AUC was not significantly different following acute stress versus control. Measures of acute stress reactivity were not associated with ghrelin AUC. Contrary to our hypothesis, among Hispanic pregnant women with overweight and obesity, exposure to an acute stress induction task did not alter postprandial ghrelin concentrations, and changes in individual psychological and physiological stress reactivity did not associate with postprandial ghrelin. However, our findings suggest that maternal report of general perceived stress over the last month is associated with higher fasting and postprandial ghrelin concentrations. Differences in the effects of short-term stress exposure versus day-to-day perception of stress on appetite and food intake in pregnancy deserves further investigation.

Stress reactivity in salivary cortisol and electrocardiogram in adolescents: Investigating sleep disturbances and insomnia.

This study examined the role of sleep disturbances and insomnia in the context of stress reactivity in adolescence. One-hundred and thirty-five 11-18 year olds (Mage = 14.2 years, SD= 1.9, 52% female) completed the Trier Social Stress Test for Children. Salivary cortisol and subjective stress ratings were collected at six time points, and heart rate as well as heart rate variability were measured pre-, during and post-stress induction. Additionally, sleep disturbances and insomnia diagnosis were assessed by a self-report questionnaire and a sleep interview. Robust mixed models investigated if adolescents with compared with adolescents without (a) sleep disturbances and (b) insomnia differ regarding cortisol, heart rate, heart rate variability and psychological stress reactivity considering gender effects. The results indicated that boys with high sleep disturbances showed higher cortisol activity compared with boys with low sleep disturbances, B= 0.88, p< 0.05. Moreover, in boys with insomnia, heart rate and alpha 1 significantly differ less than in boys without insomnia. These findings support the notion of sex differences regarding the association between poor sleep and increased activity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, and a less adaptable autonomic nervous system in boys in response to an experimental social stress task.

The prevalence of psychological stress in student populations during the COVID-19 epidemic: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Following the COVID-19 outbreak, psychological stress was particularly pronounced in the student population due to prolonged home isolation, online study, closed management, graduation, and employment pressures. The objective of this study is to identify the incidence of psychological stress reactions in student populations following a global outbreak and the associated influencing factors. Four English databases (Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Web of Science) and four Chinese biomedical databases (Chinese Biomedical Literature Database, VIP Database for Chinese Technical Periodicals, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang) were searched in this study. We also retrieved other search engines manually. The search period was from the time of database creation to 10 March 2022. This study included cross-sectional studies related to psychological stress reactions in student populations during the COVID-19 epidemic. Three groups of researchers screened the retrieved studies and assessed the quality of the included studies using the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Cross-Sectional Study Quality Assessment Checklist. A random-effects model was used to analyze the prevalence of depression, anxiety, stress, and fear symptoms in the student population during the COVID-19 epidemic. Of the 146,330 records retrieved, we included 104 studies (n = 2,088,032). The quality of included studies was moderate. The prevalence of depressive symptoms in the student population during the epidemic was 32.0% (95% CI [28.0–37.0%]); anxiety symptoms was 28.0% (95% CI [24.0–32.0%]); stress symptoms was 31.0% (95% CI [23.0–39.0%]); and fear symptoms was 33.0% (95% CI [20.0–49.0%]). The prevalence differed by gender, epidemic stage, region, education stage, student major and assessment tool. The prevalence of psychological stress in the student population during the COVID-19 epidemic may be higher compared to the global prevalence of psychological stress. We need to alleviate psychological stress in the student population in a targeted manner to provide mental health services to safeguard the student population.

ME-PLAN: A deep prototypical learning with local attention network for dynamic micro-expression recognition

As one of the important psychological stress reactions, Micro-expressions (MEs) are spontaneous and subtle facial movements, which usually occur in a high-stake situation and can reveal genuine human feelings and cognition. ME, Recognition (MER) has essential applications in many fields such as lie detection, criminal investigation, and psychological healing. However, due to the challenges of learning discriminative ME features via fleeting facial subtle reactions as well as the shortage of available MEs data, this research topic is still far from well-studied. To this end, in this paper, we propose a deep prototypical learning framework, namely ME-PLAN, with a local attention mechanism for the MER problem. Specifically, ME-PLAN consists of two components, i.e., a 3D residual prototypical network and a local-wise attention module, where the former aims to learn the precise ME feature prototypes through expression-related knowledge transfer and episodic training, and the latter could facilitate the attention to the local facial movements. Furthermore, to alleviate the dilemma that most MER methods need to depend on manually annotated apex frames, we propose an apex frame spotting method with Unimodal Pattern Constrained (UPC) and further extract ME key-frames sequences based on the detected apex frames to train our proposed ME-PLAN in an end-to-end manner. Finally, through extensive experiments and interpretable analysis regarding the apex frame spotting and MER on composite-database, we demonstrate the superiority and effectiveness of the proposed methods.

Development and validation of a stress response measure: the Daily Stress Response Scale (DSRS)

BackgroundTo date, there is a lack of measures for capturing a broad spectrum of psychophysiological stress reactions that can be administered on a daily basis and in different contexts. A need for such a measure is especially salient in settings where stress processes can unfold momentarily and substantially fluctuate daily. Therefore, the main aim of the current study was to develop and validate the Daily Stress Response Scale (DSRS), an instrument capturing a broad spectrum of psycho-physiological stress reactions that can be administered in real time and in different contexts.Participants and procedureThe study was conducted in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. Participants were 7228 (81% female) Polish university students. The data were collected anonymously through self-completion questionnaires. The DSRS was subject to confirmatory factor analyses (CFA).ResultsThe DSRS is a 30-item, easy-to-use stress response measure with excellent psychometric properties. Based on CFA results, the scale consists of two subscales, psychological and physiological stress response, which form associations with related external criteria.ConclusionsThe DSRS is a reliable and valid measure of psychological and physiological stress reactions that can be used to assess the stress response to daily stressors, including those of an acute nature, such as a crisis, trauma, or surgery.

Development and validation of a stress response measure: the Daily Stress Response Scale (DSRS)

BackgroundTo date, there is a lack of measures for capturing a broad spectrum of psychophysiological stress reactions that can be administered on a daily basis and in different contexts. A need for such a measure is especially salient in settings where stress processes can unfold momentarily and substantially fluctuate daily. Therefore, the main aim of the current study was to develop and validate the Daily Stress Response Scale (DSRS), an instrument capturing a broad spectrum of psycho-physiological stress reactions that can be administered in real time and in different contexts.Participants and procedureThe study was conducted in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. Participants were 7228 (81% female) Polish university students. The data were collected anonymously through self-completion questionnaires. The DSRS was subject to confirmatory factor analyses (CFA).ResultsThe DSRS is a 30-item, easy-to-use stress response measure with excellent psychometric properties. Based on CFA results, the scale consists of two subscales, psychological and physiological stress response, which form associations with related external criteria.ConclusionsThe DSRS is a reliable and valid measure of psychological and physiological stress reactions that can be used to assess the stress response to daily stressors, including those of an acute nature, such as a crisis, trauma, or surgery.

Relationship between Sensitivity Tendency and Psychological Stress Reactivity in Healthy Students.

This study examined the relationship between sensory processing sensitivity and psychological stress reactivity in 69 healthy Japanese university students. The Japanese version of the Highly Sensitive Person Scale and the Japanese version of the Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile were used for subjective assessment. The Galvanic skin response was measured as an objective measure of stress responses while the participants were completing the Stroop task. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test, the Spearman rank correlation coefficient, and the Mann–Whitney U test were conducted for data analysis. The results demonstrated that there was no significant correlation between the Japanese version of the Highly Sensitive Person Scale and Galvanic skin response. However, there was a marginal trend toward significance between low registration in the Japanese version of the Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile and Galvanic skin response (rs = 0.231, p < 0.10; rs = 0.219, p < 0.10), suggesting that self-rated sensitivity was not necessarily associated with objective measures. These results indicate that sensory processing sensitivity analyses require the consideration of the traits and characteristics of the participants and multifaceted evaluations using a sensitivity assessment scale other than the Japanese version of the Highly Sensitive Person Scale.

Class size affects preservice teachers’ physiological and psychological stress reactions: An experiment in a virtual reality classroom

Teachers frequently express stress associated with teaching in large classrooms. Despite the time-honored tradition in teacher stress research of treating class size as a job-related stressor, the underlying premise that class size directly impacts teachers’ stress reactions remains untested. In this randomized controlled experiment targeted at preservice teachers, we utilized a standardized virtual reality (VR) classroom to examine whether class size (number of student avatars) directly affected physiological (heart rate) or psychological (subjective rating) stress reactions among 65 preservice teachers. Results from linear mixed-effects modeling (LMM) showed that class size significantly predicted both their physiological and psychological stress reactions in the simulated environment: Average heart rate and subjective stress ratings were both significantly higher in the large class size condition. Further investigations into the causes of this association has been proposed. These findings may contribute to a better understanding of the effects of classroom features on preservice teachers’ emotional experiences and well-being.

Improvement of Negative Psychological Stress Response in Elderly Patients With Femoral Neck Fracture by Integrated High-Quality Nursing Model of Medical Care.

ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to explore the nursing effect and negative psychological stress response of elderly patients with femoral neck fracture by applying the high-quality nursing mode of medical care.MethodsA total of 130 elderly patients with femoral neck fractures hospitalized in our hospital from January 2020 to June 2021 were randomly divided into the control group and observation group, with 65 patients in each group. The control group adopted the conventional nursing mode, while the observation group adopted the high-quality nursing mode of medical care. The observation indexes selected in this study are nursing satisfaction, hip flexion activity on the 1, 15, and 30 days after the operation, the time when the affected limb was lifted off the bed actively, and the anxiety and depression of patients.ResultsOn the 1, 15, and 30 days after the operation, there were statistically significant differences between the two groups in hip flexion activity and the time when the affected limb was lifted off the bed (P < 0.05). The nursing satisfaction of the observation group was 95.38%, which was statistically significant compared with the 80.00% of the control group (P < 0.05). After treatment, the self rating depression scale (SDS) and self rating anxiety scale (SAS) scores in the observation group were lower than those in the control group (P < 0.05).ConclusionThe high-quality nursing model of medical care can effectively promote the rehabilitation of elderly patients with femoral neck fracture, reduce the negative psychological stress reaction of patients, and improve nursing satisfaction, which has important application value and guiding significance for the nursing of patients with femoral neck fracture.

Post-SSRI Sexual Dysfunction (PSSD): Biological Plausibility, Symptoms, Diagnosis, and Presumed Risk Factors.

Post-SSRI sexual-dysfunction (PSSD) is an iatrogenic syndrome, the underlying neurobiological mechanisms of which are unclear. Symptom onset follows cessation of serotonergic antidepressants i.e. Selective Serotonin and Norepinephrine Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRI's, SNRI's), and Tricyclic antidepressants (TCA's). PSSD symptoms include genital anesthesia, erectile dysfunction and orgasmic/ejaculatory anhedonia, and should be differentiated from depression-related sexual-dysfunction. Recently, accumulated data of numerous case-reports suggest additional non-sexual symptoms including, anhedonia, apathy, and blunted affect. PSSD gained official recognition after the European medical agency concluded that PSSD is a medical condition that persists after discontinuation of SSRI's and SNRI's. To review possible underlying neurobiological mechanisms of this syndrome, update information on the pathophysiology, present a list of potential risk-factors and discuss potential management options for PSSD. Extensive literature review on the main symptom-patterns of this disorder was undertaken using PubMed. It includes introductory explications of relevant neurobiology with the objective of generating hypothesis. Precipitating factors for PSSD include previous exposure to certain drugs, genetic predisposition, psychological stress or chemical stressful reaction to antidepressants along pre-existing medical conditions affecting neuroplasticity. Different theories have been proposed to explain the pathophysiology of PSSD: epigenetic gene expression, dopamine-serotonin interactions, serotonin neurotoxicity and hormonal changes. The diagnosis of PSSD is achieved by excluding all other etiologies of sexual-dysfunction. Treatment is challenging, and many strategies have been suggested without definitive outcomes. We offer the contours of a future neurobiological research agenda, and propose several underlying mechanisms for the various symptoms of PSSD which could be the foundation for a future treatment algorithm. There is a need for well-designed neurobiological research in this domain, as well as in the prevalence, pathophysiology, and treatment of PSSD. Practitioners should be alert to the distinctive features of PSSD. Misdiagnosing this syndrome might lead to harmful treatments including reinstatement of medications which generated PSSD. Sexual Medicine Reviews. Peleg LC, Rabinovitch D, Lavie Y, et al. Post-SSRI Sexual Dysfunction (PSSD): Biological Plausibility, Symptoms, Diagnosis, and Presumed Risk Factors. Sex Med Rev 2022;10:91-98.

Perceived control and reactivity to acute stressors: Variations by age, race and facets of control

Greater perceived control is associated with better health and well-being outcomes, possibly through more adaptive stress processes. Yet little research has examined whether facets of perceived control (personal mastery and perceived constraints) predict psychological and physiological stress reactivity. The present study evaluated the associations of personal mastery and perceived constraints with changes in subjective stress and cortisol in response to acute laboratory stressors, with age and race as potential moderators. In the Midlife in the United States Refresher Study (N=633 adults aged 25-75), participants completed a baseline perceived control measure and were subsequently recruited to participate in the laboratory stress protocol. The protocol consisted of completing two mental stress tasks (mental arithmetic and Stroop) as well as providing saliva samples and subjective stress ratings. Race moderated the association between perceived constraints and subjective stress reactivity, such that higher constraints predicted greater subjective stress responses in White participants, but no association was observed in Black participants. Higher personal mastery and perceived constraints each predicted greater increases in cortisol in response to the stress tasks (AUCi ) among younger but not older adults. These findings suggest that older adults were buffered against the association between facets of control and cortisol stress reactivity. Discussion on potential racial differences in the link between constraints and stress reactivity are elaborated further, as well as considerations for future work to distinguish between facets of control and examine age and racial differences.

Research on Prediction Algorithm of Employees’ Psychological Stress Based on Multifeature Fusion

A multifeature fusion-based enterprise employee psychological stress prediction algorithm is suggested to address the concerns of low prediction accuracy, long duration, and poor results in current psychological stress prediction approaches. Examine ECG signal generation and properties, as well as the notion and causes of heart rate variability. The ECG signal is gathered according to the psychological stress reaction mechanism, and the digital filter is utilized to filter and preprocess the noise interference of the ECG signal. The linear discriminant analysis algorithm extracts the time domain linear features, frequency domain linear features, and nonlinear features of the ECG signal and then selects the ECG signal characteristics. D-S evidence theory is used to fuse the time domain linear characteristics, frequency domain linear characteristics, and nonlinear characteristics of the ECG signal, construct the psychological stress prediction model, obtain the final result of psychological stress state prediction, and realize the psychological stress prediction of enterprise employees, all based on multifeature fusion technology. The results of the experiments reveal that the suggested algorithm has a greater predictive effect on employee psychological stress, allowing it to enhance forecast accuracy and reduce prediction time.

Association between working overtime and psychological stress reactions in elementary and junior high school teachers in Japan: a large-scale cross-sectional study.

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between working overtime and psychological stress reactions among school teachers. It also evaluated the interaction of overtime work types (on weekdays, on holidays, and bringing work home) and task content (educational, peripheral and both). This cross-sectional study was conducted on Japanese elementary and junior high school teachers. Primary outcome was psychological stress reactions measured with the Brief Job Stress Questionnaire. Participants were asked how long they work overtime on weekdays, holidays, and at home. Participants were also asked whether they engaged in educational tasks and/or peripheral tasks during that overtime work. Multiple linear regression analyses were applied and 6,135 participants were included in the analyses after imputing missing data. Working hours of all three types were significantly correlated with higher psychological stress reactions. Moreover, engaging in both educational and peripheral tasks showed higher psychological stress reactions than in only educational tasks when working overtime on weekdays and holidays. In conclusion, reducing overtime work regardless of work types is crucial for mitigating psychological stress reactions for teachers. It might also be possible to manage the psychological stress reactions by splitting the role of task contents, when working overtime on weekdays and holidays at school.

Secondary Traumatic Stress and Vigor Among Neonatal Intensive Care Unit Personnel: The Moderator Role of Coping Flexibility.

The demanding and highly stressful work environment of the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) has led to the identification of a possible psychological stress reaction among NICU nurses and physicians, termed secondary traumatic stress (STS). The current study aimed to explore the association between vigor at work (as an energy resource) and STS, while considering their association with the professional role (nurses/physicians-as a condition resource) as well as with coping flexibility (as a personal resource). In this cross-sectional study physicians and nurses working in NICUs across Israel completed a questionnaire comprising sections on demographics and professional characteristics, self-rated health, STS, coping flexibility, and vigor. Of 280 physicians and nurses approached, 70% (195) completed the questionnaire. No significant differences between nurses and physicians were found in STS adjusted for gender, being in a committed relationship, and seniority in the NICU. Vigor was negatively correlated with STS-both in the entire sample and for each professional role alone. Coping flexibility was a statistically significant moderator between vigor and STS, whereas the interaction between vigor and professional role was not significant. Specifically, the negative relationship between vigor and STS was significant when coping flexibility was more than 10.10 (61% of the participants) but not significant at lower values. The understanding of the relationship between vigor and STS, with coping flexibility as its moderator, encourages an intervention aimed at reducing stress by increasing these resources.

Post-Traumatic Stress Reaction Factors in Individuals Quarantined Due to Contact with COVID-19 Infected Individuals

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many individuals have been quarantined due to their contact with someone infected with the disease and some have experienced psychological stress reactions as a result. This study aims to explore factors affecting the psychological health and post-traumatic stress reactions in people quarantined due to COVID-19 in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Participants included an experimental group of 450 quarantined individuals and a control group of 594 non-quarantined individuals. Participants completed measures of post-traumatic stress reactions, emotional regulation, general self-rated health, and multi-dimensional scales of perceived social support, stigma, and interpersonal avoidance. Significant differences in measures were found between the quarantined and the non-quarantined groups with respect to intrusion, avoidance, hyperarousal, PTSD, degree of emotional regulation, stigma, interpersonal avoidance, and general self-rated health. Overall, our results support the hypothesis that enforced quarantine during the COVID-19 pandemic is a significant determinant of psychological effects in individuals, including post-traumatic stress reactions.

Increased symptoms of post-traumatic stress in school students soon after the start of the COVID-19 outbreak in China

BackgroundThe outbreak of Coronavirus Disease 2019(COVID-19) caused psychological stress in Chinese adults population. But we are unaware of whether the pandemic causes psychological stress on children.MethodsWe used the Children’s Impact of Event Scale questionnaire (CRIES-13) to investigate the degree of Post-traumatic Stress (PTSD) symptoms caused by the pandemic in students selected from schools in Sichuan, Jiangsu, Henan, Yunnan, and Chongqing provinces of China.ResultsA total of 7769 students(3692 male and 4077 female), aged 8–18 years, were enrolled in the study, comprising 1214 in primary schools, 2799 in junior high schools and 3756 in senior high schools. A total of 1639 students (21.1%) had severe psychological stress reactions. A large proportion of senior high school students (23.3%) experienced severe psychological stress, and they had the highest median total CRIES-13 score. Female students were more likely to experience severe psychological stress and had higher median CRIES-13 total scores than males.ConclusionCOVID-19 has placed psychological stresses on primary and secondary school students in China. These stresses are more likely to reach severe levels among female students and senior high school students.