School of Economics, Capital University of Economics and Business, Beijing 100070, China.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Dec 3;19(23):16190. doi: 10.3390/ijerph192316190.
Based on a nationwide micro-survey in China from 2018 to 2021, this paper empirically estimates the causal impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health of Chinese residents, by exploiting the distribution of the outflow population from Wuhan as an instrumental variable (IV). Our findings suggest that for every 10% increase in the cumulative confirmed cases, the number of mentally unhealthy days reported by urban residents in the past 30 days will increase by 2.19, an increase of 46.90% compared with the mean value. The impact is more significant among females, people aged 30 or above, and private-sector employees. Further evidence highlights the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on residents' expectations of future income and confidence in macroeconomic development, both of which we interpret as mechanisms related to economic concerns. In addition, application of the multi-period difference-in-differences (DID) strategy revealed that the negative impact still exists two years post-pandemic, but it has been dramatically alleviated since the initial stage.
基于 2018 年至 2021 年在中国进行的一项全国性微观调查，本文通过利用武汉流动人口的分布作为工具变量（IV），实证估计了 COVID-19 大流行对中国居民心理健康的因果影响。研究结果表明，每增加 10%的累计确诊病例，过去 30 天内城市居民报告的心理健康不佳天数将增加 2.19 天，比平均值增加 46.90%。这种影响在女性、30 岁及以上人群以及私营部门员工中更为显著。进一步的证据强调了 COVID-19 大流行对居民对未来收入的预期和对宏观经济发展信心的负面影响，我们将这两种影响解释为与经济问题相关的机制。此外，多期差分法（DID）策略的应用表明，大流行两年后这种负面影响仍然存在，但自初始阶段以来已经大大缓解。
