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The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors

The present study assesses the evolution of stressful events and psychological distress in male and female students over three different time periods of the COVID-19 pandemic in Spain: the initial “lockdown”, with no face-to-face teaching; the “new normality” period, when classes were resumed; and t...

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Autores principales: Matud, María Pilar, Zueco, Jesús, Del Pino-Espejo, Maria José, Fortes, Demelsa, Beleña, María Ángeles, Santos, Cristina, Díaz, Amelia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10670007/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37998070
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe13110180
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author Matud, María Pilar
Zueco, Jesús
Del Pino-Espejo, Maria José
Fortes, Demelsa
Beleña, María Ángeles
Santos, Cristina
Díaz, Amelia
author_facet Matud, María Pilar
Zueco, Jesús
Del Pino-Espejo, Maria José
Fortes, Demelsa
Beleña, María Ángeles
Santos, Cristina
Díaz, Amelia
author_sort Matud, María Pilar
collection PubMed
description The present study assesses the evolution of stressful events and psychological distress in male and female students over three different time periods of the COVID-19 pandemic in Spain: the initial “lockdown”, with no face-to-face teaching; the “new normality” period, when classes were resumed; and two years after the first wave of the pandemic. The participants were 1200 Spanish university students who were assessed for psychological distress, COVID-19-associated stressful events, social support, and self-esteem. Female students reported more stressful events and higher levels of psychological distress than male students during the “lockdown” and “new normality” time periods of the first wave of the pandemic. However, these differences disappeared in the third period tested, two years after the first wave of the pandemic, with female and male students showing no differences in psychological distress or in the number of stressful events. The main risk predictors of psychological distress during the first wave of the pandemic were lower self-esteem and having suffered a high number of stressful events. The last variable, number of stressful events associated with COVID-19, lost most its effect two years later, when only self-esteem presented a strong and highly significant predictive role.
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spelling pubmed-106700072023-11-09 The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors Matud, María Pilar Zueco, Jesús Del Pino-Espejo, Maria José Fortes, Demelsa Beleña, María Ángeles Santos, Cristina Díaz, Amelia Eur J Investig Health Psychol Educ Article The present study assesses the evolution of stressful events and psychological distress in male and female students over three different time periods of the COVID-19 pandemic in Spain: the initial “lockdown”, with no face-to-face teaching; the “new normality” period, when classes were resumed; and two years after the first wave of the pandemic. The participants were 1200 Spanish university students who were assessed for psychological distress, COVID-19-associated stressful events, social support, and self-esteem. Female students reported more stressful events and higher levels of psychological distress than male students during the “lockdown” and “new normality” time periods of the first wave of the pandemic. However, these differences disappeared in the third period tested, two years after the first wave of the pandemic, with female and male students showing no differences in psychological distress or in the number of stressful events. The main risk predictors of psychological distress during the first wave of the pandemic were lower self-esteem and having suffered a high number of stressful events. The last variable, number of stressful events associated with COVID-19, lost most its effect two years later, when only self-esteem presented a strong and highly significant predictive role. MDPI 2023-11-09 /pmc/articles/PMC10670007/ /pubmed/37998070 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe13110180 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Matud, María Pilar
Zueco, Jesús
Del Pino-Espejo, Maria José
Fortes, Demelsa
Beleña, María Ángeles
Santos, Cristina
Díaz, Amelia
The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors
title The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors
title_full The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors
title_fullStr The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors
title_full_unstemmed The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors
title_short The Evolution of Psychological Distress Levels in University Students in Spain during Different Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Risk and Protective Factors
title_sort evolution of psychological distress levels in university students in spain during different stages of the covid-19 pandemic: risk and protective factors
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10670007/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37998070
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe13110180
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