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Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic and its countermeasures may have had a significant impact on the psychological well-being of specific population subgroups. The present study investigated whether sexual minority men (defined here as attracted partly or exclusively to men) from an ongoing cohort stu...

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Autores principales: Marmet, Simon, Wicki, Matthias, Gmel, Gerhard, Gachoud, Céline, Bertholet, Nicolas, Studer, Joseph
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8570433/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34746075
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2021.692884
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author Marmet, Simon
Wicki, Matthias
Gmel, Gerhard
Gachoud, Céline
Bertholet, Nicolas
Studer, Joseph
author_facet Marmet, Simon
Wicki, Matthias
Gmel, Gerhard
Gachoud, Céline
Bertholet, Nicolas
Studer, Joseph
author_sort Marmet, Simon
collection PubMed
description Background: The COVID-19 pandemic and its countermeasures may have had a significant impact on the psychological well-being of specific population subgroups. The present study investigated whether sexual minority men (defined here as attracted partly or exclusively to men) from an ongoing cohort study of young Swiss men experienced different psychological impacts, levels of substance use and addictive behaviors, and to which degree pre-existing vulnerabilities and participants experiences during the crisis might explain these differences. Methods: An ongoing cohort sample based on the general population of young Swiss men (mean age = 29.07 years; SD = 1.27) was assessed before and during the COVID-19 crisis for depression, stress, sleep quality, substance use and addictive behaviors. Additionally, during the crisis, we assessed its impact in form of fear, isolation and traumatic experiences. Potential associations between these outcomes and sexual orientation (sexual minority vs. heterosexual) were tested using linear regression models. It was additionally estimated to which degree these associations were attenuated if adjusted for differences in mental health, personality and socioeconomic status before the crisis, as well as the experience of the COVID-19 crisis (infection with the virus and changes to work situation). Results: Compared to heterosexual men, sexual minority men showed higher levels of psychological trauma (b = 0.37 [0.25, 0.49]), fear (b = 0.18 [0.06, 0.30]) and isolation (b = 0.32 [0.20, 0.44]) due to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as higher levels of depression (b = 0.31 [0.20, 0.41]) and lower sleep quality (b = −0.13 [−0.24, −0.02]) during the crisis. These differences were to a large degree explained by higher pre-crisis levels of mental health problems and the personality dimension of neuroticism-anxiety. Sexual minority men showed higher overall levels of substance use and addictive behaviors, but these differences were already present before the crisis. Conclusion: The COVID-19 crisis may have worsened pre-existing vulnerabilities in sexual minority men, leading to its greater psychological impact on them than on heterosexual men. Reducing minority stress due to sexual orientation may help not only to improve mental health among important proportions of the population but also to reduce their vulnerability to crises. Services offering psychological support to sexual minorities may need to be reinforced during crises.
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spelling pubmed-85704332021-11-06 Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men Marmet, Simon Wicki, Matthias Gmel, Gerhard Gachoud, Céline Bertholet, Nicolas Studer, Joseph Front Public Health Public Health Background: The COVID-19 pandemic and its countermeasures may have had a significant impact on the psychological well-being of specific population subgroups. The present study investigated whether sexual minority men (defined here as attracted partly or exclusively to men) from an ongoing cohort study of young Swiss men experienced different psychological impacts, levels of substance use and addictive behaviors, and to which degree pre-existing vulnerabilities and participants experiences during the crisis might explain these differences. Methods: An ongoing cohort sample based on the general population of young Swiss men (mean age = 29.07 years; SD = 1.27) was assessed before and during the COVID-19 crisis for depression, stress, sleep quality, substance use and addictive behaviors. Additionally, during the crisis, we assessed its impact in form of fear, isolation and traumatic experiences. Potential associations between these outcomes and sexual orientation (sexual minority vs. heterosexual) were tested using linear regression models. It was additionally estimated to which degree these associations were attenuated if adjusted for differences in mental health, personality and socioeconomic status before the crisis, as well as the experience of the COVID-19 crisis (infection with the virus and changes to work situation). Results: Compared to heterosexual men, sexual minority men showed higher levels of psychological trauma (b = 0.37 [0.25, 0.49]), fear (b = 0.18 [0.06, 0.30]) and isolation (b = 0.32 [0.20, 0.44]) due to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as higher levels of depression (b = 0.31 [0.20, 0.41]) and lower sleep quality (b = −0.13 [−0.24, −0.02]) during the crisis. These differences were to a large degree explained by higher pre-crisis levels of mental health problems and the personality dimension of neuroticism-anxiety. Sexual minority men showed higher overall levels of substance use and addictive behaviors, but these differences were already present before the crisis. Conclusion: The COVID-19 crisis may have worsened pre-existing vulnerabilities in sexual minority men, leading to its greater psychological impact on them than on heterosexual men. Reducing minority stress due to sexual orientation may help not only to improve mental health among important proportions of the population but also to reduce their vulnerability to crises. Services offering psychological support to sexual minorities may need to be reinforced during crises. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-10-22 /pmc/articles/PMC8570433/ /pubmed/34746075 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2021.692884 Text en Copyright © 2021 Marmet, Wicki, Gmel, Gachoud, Bertholet and Studer. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Public Health
Marmet, Simon
Wicki, Matthias
Gmel, Gerhard
Gachoud, Céline
Bertholet, Nicolas
Studer, Joseph
Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men
title Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men
title_full Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men
title_fullStr Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men
title_full_unstemmed Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men
title_short Sexual Minority Orientation Is Associated With Greater Psychological Impact Due to the COVID-19 Crisis—Evidence From a Longitudinal Cohort Study of Young Swiss Men
title_sort sexual minority orientation is associated with greater psychological impact due to the covid-19 crisis—evidence from a longitudinal cohort study of young swiss men
topic Public Health
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8570433/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34746075
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2021.692884
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