Differential responses to COVID

I am presenting three more studies related to the COVID-19 pandemic. First, 

Howell et al (2022) published “The Role of Uncertainty, Worry, and Control in well-being: Evidence from the COVID-19 outbreak and pandemic in U.S. and China” in Emotion. Here’s the abstract:

Uncertainty about the future often leads to worries about what the future will bring, which can have negative consequences for health and well-being. However, if worry can act as a motivator to promote efforts to prevent undesirable future outcomes, those negative consequences of worry may be mitigated. In this article, we apply a novel model of uncertainty, worry, and perceived control to predict psychological and physical well-being among four samples collected in China (Study 1; during the early COVID-19 outbreak in China) and the United States (Studies 2–4, during 4 weeks in May 2020, 4 weeks in November 2020, and cross-sectionally between April and November 2020). Grounded in the feeling-is-for-doing approach to emotions, we hypothesized (and found) that uncertainty about one’s COVID-19 risk would predict greater worry about the virus and one’s risk of contracting it, and that greater worry would in turn predict poorer well-being. We also hypothesized, and found somewhat mixed evidence, that perceptions of control over 1’s COVID-19 risk moderated the relationship between worry and well-being such that worry was related to diminished well-being when people felt they lacked control over their risk for contracting the virus. This study is one of the first to demonstrate an indirect path from uncertainty to well-being via worry and to demonstrate the role of control in moderating whether uncertainty and worry manifest in poor well-being. 

This makes a lot of sense to me in that knowledge of risk reduces worry and, without that knowledge, worry is likely to have greater negative consequences. The next two studies look more closely at personality utilizing the Big Five. Peters et al. (2022) published “Regional Personality Differences Predict Variation in early COVID-19 Infections and Mobility Patterns Indicative of Social Distancing” in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Here’s the abstract:

I The early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic revealed stark regional variation in the spread of the virus. While previous research has highlighted the impact of regional differences in sociodemographic and economic factors, we argue that regional differences in social and compliance behaviors—the very behaviors through which the virus is transmitted—are critical drivers of the spread of COVID-19, particularly in the early stages of the pandemic. Combining self-reported personality data that capture individual differences in these behaviors (3.5 million people) with COVID-19 prevalence and mortality rates as well as behavioral mobility observations (29 million people) in the United States and Germany, we show that regional personality differences can help explain the early transmission of COVID-19; this is true even after controlling for a wide array of important sociodemographic, economic, and pandemic-related factors. We use specification curve analyses to test the effects of regional personality in a robust and unbiased way. The results indicate that in the early stages of COVID-19, Openness to experience acted as a risk factor, while Neuroticism acted as a protective factor. The findings also highlight the complexity of the pandemic by showing that the effects of regional personality can differ (a) across countries (Extraversion), (b) over time (Openness), and (c) from those previously observed at the individual level (Agreeableness and Conscientiousness). Taken together, our findings support the importance of regional personality differences in the early spread of COVID-19, but they also caution against oversimplified answers to phenomena as complex as a global pandemic.

like the cross-cultural nature of the study and the notion that regional differences can explain some of the differences in response to the pandemic. The final and most recent study is described by Aria Bendix (2022) through NBC news in an article titled “Pandemic May Have Made Young Adults More Neurotic and Less Agreeable, Study Finds.” She cites a study by Sutin (2022) published in PLOS One in which researchers collected survey data from 7100 adults in the US from January 2021 to February 2022, with additional data from 2020 and years prior to the pandemic. Here’s more from Bendix:

The degree of change was roughly equivalent to a decade’s worth of average personality changes. Young adults in particular grew moodier, more emotional and more sensitive to stress in 2021 compared to years past, according to the study.

During the 2020 period, the responses were fairly consistent with those gathered before Covid emerged. But the researchers saw significant changes during the 2021-2022 period, suggesting that the collective stress of the pandemic affected people's dispositions over time. 

Past research has already demonstrated that personalities can change as we age or develop new habits like exercising. Often as people get older, they become less neurotic, extroverted and open, but more agreeable and conscientious, said Angelina Sutin, the study’s lead author and a professor at Florida State University.

But from 2021 to 2022, adults ages 64 and under saw declines in extroversion, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness. Adults under 30 also saw an increase in neuroticism in that period, though other age groups did not. . . .

Sutin said one possible reason personalities didn't seem to change at the start of the pandemic is that there was a more hopeful attitude in 2020.

"Early on in the pandemic, there was this emphasis on coming together and working together and supporting each other," which may have made people feel more emotionally stable, Sutin said. "That’s something that kind of fell apart in the second year."

Sutin also notes that adults over 65 did not see significant personality changes during the same period. "Becoming more mature is declining in neuroticism and increasing in agreeableness and conscientiousness, and we see the opposite for younger adults in the second year of the pandemic," Sutin said. While others observe that there were events in addition to the pandemic (e.g., the 2020 election, shootings, and protests), the fact that older adults were not as adversely affected as young adults is important. Since young adults often go through major changes – going to college, getting a real job, getting married, etc. – one might expect personality to change as well. However, the degree of change in young adults in 2021-2022, if replicated, may bode badly for their coping as they move through their 20s and 30s.