Social science & medicine
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Social science & medicine · Oct 2020
Psychological resilience, depression, anxiety, and somatization symptoms in response to COVID-19: A study of the general population in China at the peak of its epidemic.
Psychological resilience is characterized as the ability to respond to extreme stress or trauma or adverse experience successfully. While the relation between public emergencies and psychological distress is well known, research on therelationship between psychological resilience and mental health is very limited during the outbreak of public health emergencies. ⋯ Our results suggest that there is a high prevalence of psychological distresses among the general population at the peak of the COVID-19 epidemic in China, which is negatively correlated with resilience. Psychological resilience represents an essential target for psychological intervention in a public health emergency.
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Social science & medicine · Oct 2020
Conspiracy theories as barriers to controlling the spread of COVID-19 in the U.S.
The COVID-19 pandemic poses extraordinary challenges to public health. ⋯ Because belief in COVID-related conspiracy theories predicts resistance to both preventive behaviors and future vaccination for the virus, it will be critical to confront both conspiracy theories and vaccination misinformation to prevent further spread of the virus in the US. Reducing those barriers will require continued messaging by public health authorities on mainstream media and in particular on politically conservative outlets that have supported COVID-related conspiracy theories.