#AloneTogether during COVID-19: Psychosocial, Behavioral and Cognitive Factors Mediate the Link between Relational Mobility and Distress
Date
2021
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Alone Together during COVID-19: Psychosocial, Behavioral and Cognitive Factors Mediate the Link between Relational Mobility and Distress
RELATIONAL MOBILITY AND DISTRESS DURING COVID-19
RELATIONAL MOBILITY AND DISTRESS DURING COVID-19
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Haverford College. Department of Psychology
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Thesis
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Award
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eng
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Haverford users only until 2026-01-01, afterwards Tri-College users only.
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Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has considerably impacted many people's lives, precipitating an emerging psychological crisis. As an era in which many of the world's people had engaged in some degree of self-isolation, this study sought to examine cultural differences inindividuals' feelings of loneliness and psychological distress between August and September of 2020 as a function of their society's Relational Mobility (i.e., the degree to which a society provides individuals with opportunities to voluntarily form and terminate relationships as desired). In the current study, 302 adults from the United States, Mexico, and Japan completed an online survey on their experiences with psychological distress and loneliness during COVID-19, which included measures of cultural values, coping strategies, social expectations, and social technology use. Additionally, participants completed measures on the degree of connectedness and separation they felt during COVID-19, using two psychometrically valid scales that were newly developed from qualitative pilot data. Results revealed that Relational Mobility negatively predicted both psychological distress and loneliness. Multiple mediator path analyses revealed that four factors—Unmet Romantic Expectations, Approach Coping, Connection Appraisal, and Social Technology Use—explained these negative links. When further examining different forms of social technology use, exploratory analyses revealed that while social media and gaming positively predicted feelings of psychological distress and loneliness, videoconferencing, a more naturalistic form of social technology use, negatively predicted distress and loneliness. Our findings offer insight into the mechanisms underlying cultural differences in pandemic-related distress and hold the potential toinform clinical interventions and policy for future global crises.