Cumulative Pandemic Stressors, Psychosocial Resources, and Psychological Distress: Toward a More Comprehensive Test of a Pandemic Stress Process

Abstract

Although the mental health consequences of individual COVID-19 stressors (e.g., bereavement, job loss, or financial strain) have been well-documented, little is known about the cumulative toll of multiple pandemic stressors. Using national data from the Crime, Health, and Politics Survey (May–June 2021), we test whether the accumulation of pandemic stressors is associated with greater psychological distress. We also consider whether this association is moderated by psychosocial resources (i.e., mastery, self-esteem, and social support). Our findings suggest that individuals who report three or more pandemic stressors tend to exhibit greater psychological distress than those who report fewer pandemic stressors or no pandemic stressors. While mastery offsets the impact of pandemic stressors at higher levels of stress exposure (i.e., two or more COVID-19 stressors), social support and self-esteem played a stress-buffering role to a point, but became ineffective at the highest levels of pandemic stress. The current study provides new insights into the pandemic stress process by conceptualizing and operationalizing the cumulative impact of COVID-19 stressors. We also confirm the continued significance of traditional coping resources in the context of novel pandemic stressors.

Aftermath of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Resilience and Mental Health of Emerging Adult University Students

“…This would be in line with a corpus of evidence showing that the cumulative load of multiple stressors impacts mental health more severely than any one particular stressor [47]. Recently, in an investigation of the cumulative toll of pandemic stressors on the mental health consequences of pandemic-related stressors the authors found that those with three or more pandemic stressors exhibit more distress during the pandemic [48]. Mastery moderated stressors at higher levels of stress exposure, while social support and self-esteem became ineffective at the highest levels of pandemic stress.…”

“…In any case, the results need to be cautiously interpreted, since they may be particular to young women. Young women who live at home may be more protected against adversity, as some studies report [48]. Therefore, they may exhibit higher resilience levels.…”

“…Yet, other studies indicate that living on their own may decrease resilience in young people, especially during the confinement due to COVID-19, when resilience was higher among university students living alone or with other people, rather than with their parents [52]. Family relationships and dynamics may be negatively impacted during adversity, as the literature on the impact of COVID-19 on family and offspring resilience, well-being, and overall adaptation suggests [48]. The extent to which severe crises will impact families and young people largely depends on other factors and processes in their lives, such as mechanisms related to building and maintaining support networks [53,54] and to optimizing family belief systems to better understand pandemic-related events [53,55,56].…”

“…It attempted to answer scientific calls to explore issues around the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on mental health and resilience [5,6]. It focused on emerging adults, a group who many researchers consider potentially more vulnerable to external crises: apart from the inherent instability in many life domains that youths need to face and the life changing decisions they are called to make, external severe crises, such as the latest pandemic, may amount to cumulative stress, with potentially severe negative implications for their mental health, well-being, and resilience [48]. In addition, the study concentrated on university students as the pandemic-related educational disruptions brought about by governmentimposed measures to contain the spread of the virus, such as lockdowns, social isolation, and loss of family income, arguably affect their education and career prospects as well as social relations [24,26,27].…”

Inflation hardship, gender, and mental health

“…Importantly, findings suggest that a relationship with distress exists across the gradient of inflation hardship exposure, with individuals exposed to five or more inflation hardships reporting the highest level of distress. This finding is supported by research that has examined the impact of cumulative hardships, such as recession related hardships or life event hardships, on mental health, finding that a greater number of hardships is associated with worse mental health ( Koltai & Stuckler, 2020 ; Louie et al, 2023 ; Sternthal et al, 2011 ; H. A. Turner et al, 2006 ).…”