The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Depressive Symptoms in China: A Longitudinal, Population-Based Study

Zhou, Yi; Cai, Weicheng; Xie, Liyang

doi:10.2139/ssrn.4018234

Cited by 1 publication

(6 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…References 6 It must be noted however that some non-representative studies on the Chinese population [6] [49] [50] find a higher prevalence of depression and more symptoms of mental health issues in individuals who are older than 60. 7 A finding is consistent with other studies that are based on the Chinese population [6] [7] [25] [49] [50] Table S3: Attrition Analysis: The first column represents the basic statistical information of the observations for the whole sample from the raw CFPS dataset. The second column represents the basic statistics information of the observations for the sample after the missing values of the depression symptoms were dropped.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

“…They examine the effect of COVID incidence on the mental health of individuals in different provinces (whereas we focus on the difference in average between the pre-COVID period and the first COVID wave). Their results are fully consistent with ours, although [7] do not analyze how personality affects mental health deterioration, as we do.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 92%

“…Overall, these mixed findings related to gender are in line with [48], who in an international meta-analysis did not find clear gender differences when comparing the mental health effects of the pandemic. We find that individuals who have lower educational backgrounds and lower incomes are affected by COVID-19 more compared with individuals who have higher educational backgrounds and higher incomes 7 . However, the evidence on the differential effect on education are mixed in US-based studies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

“…We find that individuals who have lower educational backgrounds and lower incomes are affected by COVID-19 more compared with individuals who have higher educational backgrounds and higher incomes 7 . However, the evidence on the differential effect on education are mixed in US-based studies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

“…They find that the beginning of the coronavirus epidemic led to a 74% drop in overall emotional well-being. The other is [7] that, like the current study, is based on the CFPS dataset. They examine the effect of COVID incidence on the mental health of individuals in different provinces (whereas we focus on the difference in average between the pre-COVID period and the first COVID wave).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

COVID-19 and Mental Health in China: Effects of Personality and Demographics

Zhang¹,

Battisti

Proto

2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

China was the first country affected by the COVID-19 virus and it reacted strongly in the first months of 2020. This paper presents new evidence on the deterioration in mental health in China between 2018 and 2020. Using two waves of the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) we can follow the same individuals pre and during the pandemic periods. We find clear evidence of a moderate level of mental health deterioration between 2018 and 2020. The prevalence of severe cases of depression, measured using an eight-item version of the common CES-D scale, increased from 6.33% in 2018 to 7.54% in 2020; quantifiable as around a 19% increase. This deterioration is higher for individuals who are subject to strict lockdowns, about 0.3 symptoms more on average, and it is stronger among those who already reported symptoms of depression in the 2018 wave of data. The effects we find are larger for individuals with more open personalities: one standard deviation of the Openness trait corresponds to 0.08 more symptoms, while more Neurotic individuals do not seem to be more affected. Younger cohorts and individuals with lower levels of education are more affected. Males seem slightly more affected than females, although this difference is statistically non-significant.

show abstract