Which personality traits can mitigate the impact of the pandemic? Assessment of the relationship between personality traits and traumatic events in the COVID-19 pandemic as mediated by defense mechanisms

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant influence on the lives of people around the world and could be a risk factor for mental health diseases. This study aimed to explore the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic by identifying patterns related to post-traumatic symptoms by considering personality and defensive styles. Specifically, it was hypothesized that neuroticism was negatively associated with impact of event, as opposed to extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness traits. The mediation role of mature, neurotic, and immature defenses in these relationships was also investigated. This study involved 557 Italian individuals (71.3% women, 28.7% men; Mage = 34.65, SD = 12.05), who completed an online survey including the Impact of Event Scale—Revised, Forty Item Defense Style Questionnaire (DSQ-40) and Ten Item Personality Inventory. Results showed a nonsignificant effect for extraversion and openness on impact of event. The negative influence of neuroticism was instead confirmed in a partial parallel mediation involving significant effects from immature and neurotic defenses in the indirect path. Finally, agreeableness and conscientiousness delineated two protective pathways regarding impact of event, determining two total parallel mediation models in which both these personality traits were negatively associated with immature defensive styles, and conscientiousness was also positively related to mature defenses. These findings provide an exploration post-traumatic symptom patterns during the COVID-19 pandemic, involving the big five personality traits and defense mechanisms. These results may be useful for developing interventions, treatments, and prevention activities.

The impact of COVID‐19 lockdown on perceived stress: The role of defence mechanisms and coping strategies

“…With regard to defence mechanisms, from the implemented models it emerges that anxiety was negatively associated with the use of mature styles which was in turn related to lower stress, as opposed to neurotic or immature ones. This is in line with previous studies conducted during the lockdown which highlighted the association between mature and neurotic mechanisms with posttraumatic symptoms (Gori et al, 2021 ) and the negative association between mature defences with psychological symptoms (Di Giuseppe et al, 2020 ; Gori et al, 2020 ).…”

“…Therefore, an integration of our results with existing evidence can provide a useful contribution for more effective management of the emergency and its psychological consequences, as well as physical ones. For example, previous studies highlighted individual differences concerning the use of mature, neurotic, immature defences and their contribution in determining the impact of events during the COVID‐19 lockdown (Gori et al, 2021 ), while others have emphasized the protective effect of life satisfaction in comparisons of perceived stress (Gori et al, 2020 ). In other words, these and other research identify risk or protective factors regarding some variables considered in this study, which therefore adds a further piece in this field and can be useful for future research and to provide further knowledge of the psychological consequences of restrictive measures related to COVID‐19.…”

Across the COVID-19 Waves; Assessing Temporal Fluctuations in Perceived Stress, Post-Traumatic Symptoms, Worry, Anxiety and Civic Moral Disengagement over One Year of Pandemic

“…Restrictions to contain the virus, economic instability, risk of contagion, uncertainty about the future, unpredictability of the virus spread, and the growing emergence of its variants may cause significant and lasting effects on mental health [ 6 ]. Some cross-sectional studies have already shown the emotional impact of the lockdown and the early stages of the pandemic, highlighting high levels of distress [ 7 , 8 ], post-traumatic symptoms [ 7 , 9 ], worry [ 10 , 11 ], and anxiety [ 7 , 11 ], underlining the strong link between compliance with restrictions and moral disengagement [ 12 ], and noting the differences in the effects on mental health according to gender [ 13 , 14 ]. One year after the outbreak, with the in-place vaccination campaign, maintenance of preventive measures, and alternation of localized closure phases, it could be important to monitor the progress of the psychological effects of the health emergency in order to promote adequate and targeted implementation of supportive and therapeutic interventions [ 15 ].…”

Psychological Distress in Healthcare Workers between the First and Second COVID-19 Waves: The Role of Personality Traits, Attachment Style, and Metacognitive Functioning as Protective and Vulnerability Factors

“…Regarding vulnerability and protective factors of psychological distress, a growing number of studies have found that a person's individual characteristics, such as personality traits, may account for some of the variances in people's (including HCWs') reactions to the pandemic [35][36][37][38], which is consistent with findings from pre-pandemic studies [39,40]. Although there is sufficient research on the relationship between personality traits and mental health, the relationship between personality traits and both attachment style and metacognitive functioning during the COVID-19 pandemic is still under-developed and usually focused on the general population rather than HCWs specifically.…”