Liu Tzu-Hsuan, Xia Yiwei, Ma Zhihao
School of Political Science and Public Administration, Huaqiao University, Quanzhou, China.
School of Law, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, Chengdu, China.
Front Psychiatry. 2022 Jun 30;13:816298. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.816298. eCollection 2022.
The novel coronavirus disease pandemic is still proliferating and is not expected to end any time soon. Several lockdowns and social distancing measures might be implemented in the future. A growing body of research has explored the effect of personality on individuals' psychological wellbeing during the pandemic. However, most prior studies have not discussed the dynamic and reciprocal transactions between personality and psychological distress in various situations. Therefore, this study aims to explore the internal mechanisms of the ways in which certain personality traits triggered specific symptoms during and after college lockdown, by using network analysis.
Based on survey data from 525 university students in China, the study detected the connection between individual personality and psychological distress through network analysis. Of the participants, 70.1% were female, and 20.9% were male. The mean age of the participants was 19.701 (SD = 1.319) years. We estimated networks two steps: First, two networks that only contain the Big Five personality traits and the six symptoms of psychological distress during and after the lockdown measure were estimated. Second, we add control variables and re-estimated the networks to check whether the linkages among the Big Five personality traits and the six symptoms of psychological distress observed in the first step were stable. Moreover, we employed strength centrality as the key indicator to present the potential significance of diverse variables within a network.
The findings demonstrate that, first, "depress" was the central symptom in the network during the college lockdown, while "efforts" was the central symptom after the lockdown. Second, the symptoms of "restless" and "worthless" significantly declined after the lockdown. Third, we found that there is an internal mechanism through which personality affected certain psychological symptoms during and after lockdowns. Specifically, neuroticism triggered certain symptoms during and after the lockdown, while extraversion and conscientiousness suppressed certain symptoms. Substantial evidence on internal linkages is imperative to develop effective interventions.
This study explores the internal mechanisms of the ways in which certain personality traits trigger specific symptoms. Overall, our results provide empirical evidence that personality traits play a key role in how individuals with certain traits respond to college lockdown during a pandemic. The study makes a significant contribution to the literature because it is among the first few studies which explores the effects of personality traits on individual psychological distress using network analysis during the pandemic.
新型冠状病毒病大流行仍在蔓延，短期内预计不会结束。未来可能会实施多项封锁和社交距离措施。越来越多的研究探讨了人格在大流行期间对个体心理健康的影响。然而，大多数先前的研究并未讨论人格与心理困扰在各种情况下的动态和相互作用。因此，本研究旨在通过网络分析探索某些人格特质在大学封锁期间及之后引发特定症状的内在机制。
基于对中国525名大学生的调查数据，该研究通过网络分析检测个体人格与心理困扰之间的联系。参与者中，70.1%为女性，20.9%为男性。参与者的平均年龄为19.701岁（标准差 = 1.319）。我们分两步估计网络：首先，估计两个仅包含大五人格特质以及封锁措施期间及之后心理困扰的六种症状的网络。其次，我们添加控制变量并重新估计网络，以检查第一步中观察到的大五人格特质与心理困扰的六种症状之间的联系是否稳定。此外，我们采用强度中心性作为关键指标来呈现网络中不同变量的潜在重要性。
研究结果表明，首先，“抑郁”是大学封锁期间网络中的核心症状，而“努力”是封锁后网络中的核心症状。其次，“烦躁不安”和 “毫无价值” 的症状在封锁后显著下降。第三，我们发现人格在封锁期间及之后影响某些心理症状存在一种内在机制。具体而言，神经质在封锁期间及之后引发某些症状，而外向性和尽责性则抑制某些症状。关于内在联系的大量证据对于制定有效的干预措施至关重要。
本研究探索了某些人格特质引发特定症状所采用方式的内在机制。总体而言，我们的结果提供了实证证据，证明人格特质在具有某些特质的个体如何应对大流行期间的大学封锁中起着关键作用。该研究对文献做出了重大贡献，因为它是最早使用网络分析探讨大流行期间人格特质对个体心理困扰影响的研究之一。
