scholarly journals COVID-19 pandemic and health worker stress: The mediating effect of emotional regulation

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (11) ◽  
pp. e0259013
Author(s):  
Zoilo Emilio García-Batista ◽  
Kiero Guerra-Peña ◽  
Vahid Nouri Kandany ◽  
María Isabel Marte ◽  
Luis Eduardo Garrido ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Emotion Regulation ◽  
Health Personnel ◽  
Mediating Effect ◽  
Continuous Exposure ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Emotion Regulation Strategies ◽  
Emotion Suppression ◽  
Stress Levels ◽  
Regulation Strategies ◽  
The Impact

Background/Introduction Psychological and physical well-being of health personnel has been significantly affected by COVID-19. Work overload and continuous exposure to positive COVID-19 cases have caused them fatigue, stress, anxiety, insomnia and other detriments. This research aims: 1) to analyze whether the use of cognitive reevaluation and emotional suppression strategies decreases and increases, respectively, stress levels of health personnel; 2) to quantify the impact of contact with patients with COVID-19 on stress levels of medical staff. Method Emotion regulation strategies (cognitive reevaluation and emotional expression) and stress levels were evaluated in 155 Dominican physicians who were treating people infected with COVID-19 at the moment of the study (67.9% women and 32.1% men; mean age = 34.89; SD = 9.26). In addition, a questionnaire created by the researchers quantified the impact that contact with those infected had on their stress levels. Results Contact with patients with COVID-19 predicts increased use of emotion suppression strategies, although is not associated with the use of cognitive reevaluation. These findings lead to an even greater increase in stress on health care providers. Conclusions Contextual contingencies demand immediate responses and may not allow health personnel to use cognitive re-evaluation strategies, leaning more towards emotion suppression. However, findings regarding high levels of stress require the implementation of intervention programs focused on the promotion of more functional emotion regulation strategies. Such programs may reduce current stress and prevent post-traumatic symptoms.

scholarly journals COVID-19 pandemic and health worker stress: The mediating effect of emotional regulation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zoilo Emilio García-Batista ◽  
Kiero Guerra-Peña ◽  
Vahid Nouri Kandany ◽  
Maria Isabel Marte ◽  
Luis Eduardo Garrido ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Emotion Regulation ◽  
Health Personnel ◽  
Mediating Effect ◽  
Continuous Exposure ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Emotion Regulation Strategies ◽  
Emotion Suppression ◽  
Stress Levels ◽  
Regulation Strategies ◽  
The Impact

AbstractBackground/IntroductionPsychological and physical well-being of health personnel has been significantly affected by COVID-19. Work overload and continuous exposure to positive COVID-19 cases have caused them fatigue, stress, anxiety, insomnia and other detriments. This research aims: 1) to analyze whether the use of cognitive reevaluation and emotional suppression strategies decreases and increases, respectively, stress levels of health personnel; 2) to quantify the impact of contact with patients with COVID-19 on stress’s level of medical staff.MethodEmotion regulation strategies and stress level were evaluated in 155 Dominican physicians by means of psychological tests with adequate levels of reliability. In addition, a questionnaire created by the researchers quantified the impact that contact with those infected had on their stress levels.ResultsContact with patients with COVID-19 predicts increased use of emotion suppression strategies, although is not associated with the use of cognitive reevaluation. These findings lead to an even greater increase in stress on health care providers.ConclusionsContextual contingencies demand immediate responses and may not allow health personnel to use cognitive re-evaluation strategies, leaning more towards emotion suppression. However, findings regarding high levels of stress require the implementation of intervention programs focused on the promotion of more functional emotion regulation strategies. Such programs may reduce current stress and prevent post-traumatic symptoms.

scholarly journals The simultaneous use of Emotional suppression and Situation selection to regulate emotions incrementally favors physiological responses

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Thuillard ◽  
Elise S. Dan-Glauser
Keyword(s):  
Emotion Regulation ◽  
Repeated Measures ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
Cardiac Activity ◽  
Emotion Regulation Strategies ◽  
Emotional Suppression ◽  
Negative Experience ◽  
Regulation Strategies ◽  
Simultaneous Use ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Background Emotion regulation alters the trajectories of emotional responses and, when effective, transforms the emotional responses to help individuals adapt to their environment. Previous research has mainly focused on the efficiency of regulation strategies performed individually at a given time. Yet, in daily life, it is likely that several strategies are often combined. Thus, we question in this study the combinatorial efficiency of two emotion regulation strategies, Situation selection and Emotional suppression. Methods In a within-subject design, sixty-five participants were asked to implement either no strategy, Situation selection only, Emotional suppression only, or both strategies together (four conditions) while looking at various emotionally charged images. Experience, expressivity, and physiological arousal were recorded throughout the viewing. Repeated-measures ANOVAs and corrected post-hoc tests were used for analyzing the data. Results The results of the combined strategies showed that Emotional suppression canceled the beneficial impact of Situation selection on negative experience, while significantly increasing the impact on cardiac activity. The use of both strategies together had a greater effect on respiratory function with an enhanced decrease in respiratory rate and amplitude. Conclusions The combinatorial effect of emotion regulation strategies is different according to the emotional response that the individual needs to regulate. The simultaneous use of Situation selection and Emotional suppression could be particularly beneficial to relieve physiological symptoms.

The impact of emotion awareness and regulation on social functioning in individuals at clinical high risk for psychosis

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (14) ◽  
pp. 2907-2918 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Kimhy ◽  
K. E. Gill ◽  
G. Brucato ◽  
J. Vakhrusheva ◽  
L. Arndt ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Emotion Regulation ◽  
High Risk ◽  
Social Functioning ◽  
Clinical High Risk ◽  
Emotion Regulation Strategies ◽  
Global Functioning ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Hierarchical Multiple Regression ◽  
Regulation Strategies ◽  
The Impact

BackgroundSocial functioning (SF) difficulties are ubiquitous among individuals at clinical high risk for psychosis (CHR), but it is not yet clear why. One possibility is suggested by the observation that effective SF requires adaptive emotion awareness and regulation. Previous reports have documented deficits in emotion awareness and regulation in individuals with schizophrenia, and have shown that such deficits predicted SF. However, it is unknown whether these deficits are present prior to the onset of psychosis or whether they are linked to SF in CHR individuals.MethodWe conducted a cross-sectional comparison of emotion awareness and regulation in 54 individuals at CHR, 87 with schizophrenia and 50 healthy controls (HC). Then, within the CHR group, we examined links between emotion awareness, emotion regulation and SF as indexed by the Global Functioning Scale: Social (Cornblatt et al. 2007).ResultsGroup comparisons indicated significant differences between HC and the two clinical groups in their ability to identify and describe feelings, as well as the use of suppression and reappraisal emotion-regulation strategies. Specifically, the CHR and schizophrenia groups displayed comparable deficits in all domains of emotion awareness and emotion regulation. A hierarchical multiple regression analysis indicated that difficulties describing feelings accounted for 23.2% of the SF variance.ConclusionsThe results indicate that CHR individuals display substantial emotion awareness and emotion-regulation deficits, at severity comparable with those observed in individuals with schizophrenia. Such deficits, in particular difficulties describing feelings, predate the onset of psychosis and contribute significantly to poor SF in this population.

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