Titel
Diurnal dynamics of stress and mood during COVID-19 lockdown: a large multinational ecological momentary assessment study
Autor*in
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Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in severe disruption to people's lives as governments imposed national ‘lockdowns’. Several large surveys have underlined the detrimental short- and long-term mental health consequences resulting from this disruption, but survey findings are only informative of individuals' retrospectively reported psychological states. Furthermore, knowledge on psychobiological responses to lockdown restrictions is scarce. We used smartphone-based real-time assessments in 731 participants for 7 days and investigated how individuals’ self-reported stress and mood fluctuated diurnally during lockdown in spring 2020. We found that age, gender, financial security, depressive symptoms and trait loneliness modulated the diurnal dynamics of participants' momentary stress and mood. For example, younger and less financially secure individuals showed an attenuated decline in stress as the day progressed, and similarly, more lonely individuals showed a diminished increase in calmness throughout the day. Hair collected from a subsample (n = 140) indicated a decrease in cortisol concentrations following lockdown, but these changes were not related to any of the assessed person-related characteristics. Our findings provide novel insights into the psychobiological impact of lockdown and have implications for how, when and which individuals might benefit most from interventions during psychologically demanding periods.
Stichwort
stresshair cortisolecological momentary assessmentCOVID-19diurnal changesmood
Objekt-Typ
Sprache
Englisch [eng]
Persistent identifier
Erschienen in
Titel
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Band
289
Ausgabe
1975
ISSN
0962-8452
Erscheinungsdatum
2022
Publication
The Royal Society
Projekt
Kod / Identifikator
I3381
Erscheinungsdatum
2022
Zugänglichkeit
Rechte
Rechteangabe
© 2022 The Authors
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