Year: 2024
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Having strong, diverse social relationships is tightly linked to myriad physical and mental health benefits by mitigating the negative impacts of adverse events. The COVID-19 pandemic brought increased uncertainty and changes to our social lives that reduce the spread of COVID-19 (e.g., social distancing), but also likely impacted emotional well-being. We investigated how one of these changes – changing social networks – relates to emotional bias (a proxy for well-being), specifically one’s tendency to interpret ambiguous stimuli as positive or negative (i.e., valence bias). Participants (N = 614) categorized the valence of clearly (angry and happy expressions) and ambiguously valenced stimuli (surprised expressions), and were asked about their social network before and during the pandemic. Compared to before the pandemic, participants reported a decrease in overall network size (p < .001) and number of embedded networks (i.e., a measure of network complexity represented by number of areas of social activity; p < .001). In a model with all three social network dimensions (size, complexity, diversity), network complexity uniquely predicted valence bias (p = .02). Specifically, participants with greater social network complexity during the pandemic showed a more positive bias. Further, participants that did not experience a pandemic-related reduction in network complexity were protected from pandemic-related increases in negativity (p < .001). In other words, having a more complex social network could act as a protective factor against adverse outcomes in times of uncertainty.
Authors: Eisha Haque, Nicholas R. Harp, Maital Neta
Language: English
Topic: COVID-19 and Mental Health
Subfield: Clinical Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
Awards: G1400277470, G3535623557, G4623619644, CAREER: Functional Brain Networks Mediating Positivity Bias in Healthy Aging, G6058657126, G6510616550, G6671297155, RAPID: Stress and Emotional Response to Uncertainty in the COVID-19 Pandemic, G9000145631, G9000301148, Neuroimaging Sciences Training Program
OpenAlex ID: W4402781860