Objectives The COVID-19 pandemic is associated with mental health difficulties, especially during pregnancy and early postpartum. Intolerance of uncertainty (IU) and reduced capacity for mindfulness—a protective factor for child-bearers—may be particularly relevant factors driving mental health problems given the unpredictable nature of the pandemic. The current study aims to shed light on modifiable paths to perinatal psychological distress by testing whether there is an indirect effect of IU on psychological symptoms through a perceived reduction in mindfulness during the pandemic. Methods Pregnant individuals (67%, n = 133) and new mothers within 6 months postpartum (33%, n = 66) participated in a cross-sectional online survey assessing IU, current and retrospective pre-pandemic mindfulness (FFMQ), and psychological symptoms (anxiety, depression, somatization; BSI). Perceived change in mindfulness was captured by including retrospective mindfulness as a covariate in the PROCESS macro used for analyses. Results Tests of the direct association between mindfulness, IU, and psychological symptoms showed significant effects of IU ( b = 0.46, SE = 0.064; p < .001) and perceived decrease in mindfulness during the pandemic ( b = − 0.72, SE = 0.08, p < .001) on psychological symptoms ( R 2 = .21–.34; F [2, 197] = 51.13–52.81, p < .001). The indirect effect of IU on symptoms via perceived decrease in mindfulness during the pandemic ( b = 0.13, SE = 0.043, 95%CI [.060, .226]) was significant ( R 2 = .41, F [3, 195] = 45.08, p < .001). Conclusions Results suggest that mothers who are less able to tolerate uncertainty experience more psychological symptoms, in part due to perceived reduction in mindfulness during the pandemic. Future research should examine whether IU is a screening risk marker and target for mindfulness-based interventions to improve maternal well-being and family outcomes.
Adolescence is a period of rapid biological and psychological development, characterized by increasing emotional reactivity and risk-taking, especially in peer contexts. Theories of adolescent neural development suggest that the balance in sensitivity across neural threat, reward, and regulatory systems contributes to these changes. Building on prior research, this study used a novel social feedback task to explore activation and functional connectivity in the context of social threat and reward in a sample of mid-adolescent girls (n = 86, Mage = 16.32). When receiving negative peer feedback, adolescents showed elevated activation in, and amygdala connectivity with, social processing regions (e.g. medial prefrontal cortex [mPFC], temporoparietal junction [TPJ]). When receiving positive feedback, adolescents showed elevated activation in social and reward (e.g. mPFC, ventromedial prefrontal cortex) processing regions and less striatum-cerebellum connectivity. To understand the psychological implications of neural activation and co-activation, we examined associations between neural processing of threat and reward and self-reported social goals. Avoidance goals predicted elevated amygdala and striatum connectivity with social processing regions (e.g. medial temporal gyrus [MTG]), whereas approach goals predicted deactivation in social processing regions (e.g. MTG/TPJ, precuneus), highlighting the importance of considering individual differences in sensitivity to social threat and reward in adolescence.
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